Blackest Sin
by Onetwothree-exterminate
Summary: "The blackest sin has come to pass, intent on breaking down the glass of spell's divide and boundaries plain, ensuring all who live are slain..." The words were a dark wind along the bloodstained ground, and I whispered back - "There is a new Dark Lord."
1. At Death's Door

**Warning**: Rated M for gore, violence, rape, sexual situations, language, psychological torment, genocide, mass killings, and other psychologically disturbing content.

**Disclaimer: I am neither J.K. Rowling nor her equal in writing. I do not own Harry Potter or any of its affiliates. No copyright infringement was intended in writing this FanFiction. All characters seen in the Harry Potter series belong to J.K. Rowling exclusively.**

**Summary**: With the fall of Voldemort, the world was at peace. For 25 years, it enjoyed this peace – until a new Dark Lord rose, calling himself Lord Sin and The Black Knight. He is vastly unknown and disbelieved, a rumor in the night. Few know that he is both very real and very powerful. But he is coming – and when he does, the barrier between Muggle and Wizard worlds will be shredded, and He will strike terror into the hearts of muggles and wizards alike. He can be stopped – maybe. But with a generation of war heroes unwilling to believe that evil still stalks their lands, it falls to their children – who barely know how to protect themselves, much less the world.

* * *

><p><strong>Prologue: At Death's Door.<strong>

_I knew that it wasn't going to be easy before we even began. _

Something moved in the darkness, and I couldn't tell if it was dark as night, black as sin, or even real at all. It flashed here and there, back and forth, round and round, yet it always moved closer to the shadowed edge of the city skyline.

_I guess that I never expected surviving all of this to change us._

We'd probably die here. That's what protection was, right? To die in the place of what you're defending? It just felt like dying in vain. How do you protect something you can't sense? How could we do it alone?

_But it's good, this change. We've survived enough. We're ready to die for this. _

There were more now. They'd moved past the shadows, slowed down, and I could see them. They looked the same, moved the same, their stance murderous. They stared us down, challenged us. We stood tall.

_We're ready for this. One final battle, one chance to take them down with us. _

They stopped. We stilled. Nothing, no one, moved.

_Let our blood burn, our courage boil, but most of all…_

There was a flicker of black, the world going dark. They moved.

_Let us drag them with us to death's domain._

The battle began.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter One: Fire and Ice<strong>

**Lily**

I hated the trip to the train. If the judgmental stares from the people in the station proper weren't bad enough, there were always the stares of resentment from the wizards and witches on Platform 9 ¾.

I suppose it was to be expected though. And after six years at Hogwarts, I should be used to this. It was nothing new.

"Is that her," someone whispered too loudly, "Is that really Lily Potter?"

Someone answered, and there were shocked gasps from the group of first and second years to my left. Even their parents stared now, though they were more discreet.

The whispers started.

"Is it true that she skipped a whole year?"

"She's supposedly the smartest witch in the school."

"The brightest witch of the age, they say."

"Harry Potter's her father."

"She's the best Seeker in the league."

"Set to be Head Girl seventh year."

"Fifteen – just fifteen in 6th year!"

"Rumor is she can Apparate _and_ morph into an Animagus."

"Everyone knows she's been with all the best boys in school – she hooked one from Durmstrang over summer! Everyone says so."

"I hear she's being tutored by the headmaster himself."

"Just look at her! She has to have a full glamour on to be that perfect. It's insulting."

"It's completely outrageous, isn't it?" Rose sneered to my left. "The rumors that fly around here… I could just scream sometimes! Apparently I've been dating half the Slytherin house all summer, trying to get Mikael Zabini jealous so he'll take me back. I've never looked twice at him! He's a Slytherin!"

Rose's rant continued, and I was content to listen. At least when she was talking, I could ignore what people were saying and keep myself from hexing them. I didn't need the extra problems this early in the year. I didn't need them at all with the close scrutiny I got.

"And apparently Hufflepuff's keeper James Mathers has been telling everyone that we've been…"

I looked up and down our platform, trying to see through the smoke from the train. If I could just find the rest of my group, we could disappear into the train and hopefully ignore the attention we generated.

"And this Ravenclaw boy – he's been sending me poetry. Poetry Lily! It's absolutely ridiculous. As if I could be swayed by words on a page. It's not even _good_ poetry. It's all about the probability of futures and love and…"

I spotted Raven Longbottom coming out from behind a group of fourth years. She looked odd and dreamy as always – just like her mother, Aunt Luna. I could tell she was tired of the attention by the sharp reprimanding look in her eyes. She resembled Uncle Neville, our Herbology professor, perfectly when she was annoyed.

"Raven! Over here!"

She turned to look, and her spiral glasses fell off of her head and on to her nose sharply, spraying glitter everywhere. They were probably some sort of "Ukranian Snork repellers" or the like. The cloud of glitter floated out around her as she ambled over too us, eyes a bit glazed now that she'd found a respite from the onslaught of looks.

"Hello Lily," she drawled when she came to a stop. I pushed the glasses up off her nose and hugged her soundly.

"How was the Solstice hunt Raven?"

Her smile grew wide and her eyes sparkled a bit. "We didn't catch any Snorks, so the villages in northern France will still be over run come spring, but we did sight some marvelous Florificus tracks near our campsite. We must have just missed their migration."

"Glad to hear you had fun. Have you seen the Albus or Dimitri or Teddy anywhere?"

"Oh I have!" chirped Rose. "Albus is with Bethany in the prefect car, and Teddy's off with Victoire. Dimitri is still with the rest of the Krums. He and Aleksander are fighting again." Something crashed sharply off to our lefts and Raven smiled. "That'd be them now. I do hope that Criptin is alright. They knocked his cage off the trolly."

I gave Rose one glance and raced off toward where the boys were. The two twins had a horrid case of sibling rivalry, and there was nothing to be done about it but break them up when they went at each other. They'd picked the worst possible time for this – as usual. The train was leaving in just a few minutes, and we still didn't have everybody together. People were still staring, the luggage had to be loaded, and there wasn't enough space for them not to make a mess of things, but worse than all that…

Two arms wrapped about my waist, and a soft, silky voice whispered in my ear. "Why, hello my love."

Scorpius Malfoy was here looking on to the brother's brawl.

I ripped myself out of his arms before I could feel the comfort they had always brought me. Whirling, I met his cold gray eyes, knowing my own sapphire ones were spitting sparks. Those horrible eyes brought back every memory with him, vivid and real and just too _much_. It made me want to run to him and cry until I couldn't cry anymore. It made me hate – both him and myself. Both of those made me angry as hell.

"I'm not your anything anymore. Sod off Malfoy. Go play with your Slytherin girls and leave me be."

I turned back to the brothers, hoping to separate them and get out of there before more trouble showed up.

The brawl had been a tough one. The boys were just as big as each other, thoroughly matched, and neither could overpower the other. It would have been fabulous to watch – if a stray fist had not, at that very moment – gone stray and hit me hard enough in the head to knock me out cold.

I remember only two things before I fell completely out of consciousness. Scorpius's cold, steely, hateful eyes, and overwhelming fear at being vulnerable in front of him again.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

Someone screamed off to my left – Lily's Weasley friend no doubt. The Longbottom girl looked _almost_ shocked out of her fantasy world. Albus Potter, who'd come running from inside the train at some point, looked right pissed. And the two Krum boys – the two bloody brutish Krum boys – were still wrangling on the floor.

Wands were pulled everywhere – Lily's friends were fast to draw but always slow to cast. They had the Gryffindor nobility for the most part, and the Longbottom girl had the Raven claw curse of observation.

Both boys were stupefied soundly before the yelling had even started. I kicked one brother off the other contemptuously, and barely contained myself from casting some of the darker spells I knew. To hit a woman was unforgivable enough – to hit Lily Potter was almost assuredly suicidal. If she didn't kill them for it, I would. After all that had happened, I knew what it did to her.

My icy glare went around to the entire group. Not a one of them didn't look frightened afterwards, and their fear prompted my speech, making it more menacing than my anger. "Protection is a Gryffindor trait, is it not you dolts?"

They nodded, shocked by my authoritative tone and the question both.

"And loyalty is also, I presume?" More nods.

"Then why is your friend laying bleeding on the ground, unhealed and unchecked, while not a one of you has _cast a spell?_ Why is it that the person she _fears _and _loathes_ is the one to protect her? Why are you all USELESS?"

The Longbottom girl shot forward, wand in hand, going for Lily. _Too little too late_, I thought, and stepped straight into her path, almost on top of her. She looked up at me from her place on the floor, and all I could muster as a feeling was disgust. I had never liked Lily's friends, but before… I had tolerated their idiocy. Their slow reactions had hurt Lily – they were lower than dirt to me now.

"Don't touch her," I spat, dissolving into Parseltongue. "Don't you dare touch her." The hissing, serpentine sound of it made Longbottom draw back sharply, and I struck, scooping Lily into my arms and disappearing into the train.

I took her to a back carriage, a rather old one with locks and window shades. It was dusty and in poor repair, undignified really. They wouldn't check her for a prideful Slytherin.

Setting Lily down as gently as possible, I _Accio_ed her luggage and mine to the car. Her nose healed nicely with a few simple healing spells, and she woke under another charm, rather calmly if too slowly for my tastes.

Her lashes fluttered against her rosy cheeks, dark and long. Her button nose wrinkled a bit, almost as if she was testing to see that it was healed properly. Her head rolled a bit from side to side, and her soft lips parted on the soft sigh of a single word.

"Scorpius…"

I knew then that I had been right in bringing her here. Despite her protest, despite her denials and mistrust, despite everything between us and against us, she still loved me.

Just as I loved her.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: Chapter Two: The Past Doesn't Die

Yours,

~TGA~


	2. The Past Doesn't Die

**Author's Note **

**To Clarify**: Everything between these brackets {...} is a flashback.

**Chapter 2: The Past Doesn't Die**

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

I would never forget how beautiful Lily was.

I remembered waking next to her in the Room of Requirement night after night, watching her sleep so peacefully in my arms…

I remembered waking on top of her, remorseless and confused, and staring stupidly as I took in the damage of what I'd unwillingly done – staring in horror at her destroyed clothes, her bruised and bleeding alabaster skin, the cuts on her face, the broken bones in her arm. I remembered the fear that turned her sapphire eyes black, and the way she'd run the second I was off of her.

I'd had to Incarcerate her to explain. The Black Knight – Lord Sin – loved watching the suffering of others. Everyone had heard the tales of Lord Voldemort's cruelty. Lord Sin made him look like an innocent child. The depravity of his mind and his actions, combined with the sheer force of his magic made him unstoppable. And so it had been with me.

Lord Sin had found a way to take control of the Dark Mark. He had summoned back all of the followers of Voldemort – including Father. He had somehow managed to enable a blood spell and summon the children of the Death Eaters – and those who had not been brought up in the way of the Dark Arts had been sent out Imperioed to wreak havoc on their own lives at the Black Knight's command.

Father had raised me with a thorough knowledge of the Dark Arts, and a working command of them. But he had never tried to sway my view of the world, and so I had grown into the beliefs that unnecessary pain and evil were wrong. I was thoroughly Slytherin, as anything less would be an abomination to the Malfoy name. But I was not Dark.

Lily had suffered for that. I had beaten her, not with magic, not with words, but physically beaten her, and lost her because of it. It had been unwillingly, and I had tried to fight the Imperius, but one did not fight Lord Sin. His magic was too strong, his mind too evil, to be thrown off through sheer strength of will.

It had lost me Lily. She didn't believe me, didn't believe that a terror greater than Voldemort could exist. She was a product of her blind Gryffindor parents. It was something I never thought I'd see from someone as brilliant as her, but she was in denial of the evil in the world. She saw it as clearly as anyone else.

She hadn't believed me. The moment I'd unbound her, she'd wordlessly summoned her wand, stupefied me, and run.

I would kill Lord Sin for my loss. But not before Lily believed the truth. Not before she had seen the reality of the situation.

"Scorpius…" she sighed again, and she curled closer to me on the carriage seat.

My heart ached in my chest. I'd loved her so deeply. I loved her even more now that we had been apart.

Her eyes flashed open, and the icy tone they had to them warned me a second too late of what was to come.

"_EVERTE STRATUM!"_

The spell hit me like a brick wall, and glass shattered around me. The momentum flipped me, and I had time to see the glass spewing onto the floor just before my body went skidding across it.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

I was bloody terrified.

The last time I'd seen his eyes that close had been… _that_ night. But where I had been too hurt to move then, I could defend myself now.

"_EVERTE STRATUM!_"

My magic churned and roiled within me, fighting for a way out. I hated this feeling of fear and helplessness. I hated the feeling of magic trying to push through my skin more. But if it defended me from him, I would take it.

He groaned from where he had skidded on the floor, trying to push himself up on hands and knees. Glass crunched and the faint metallic smell of blood tinged the air. I heard him suck in a shaky breath as he overcame the pain.

"Lily, I need to talk to –"

"_SILENCIO!"_

His mouth kept moving, but his wretched silky voice was gone. I was bloody terrified. His voice could make everything ok. His voice could convince me things were alright. His voice could…

{ "I love you Lily," he said, kicking me in the ribs. I heard something crack and I screamed hard enough to curdle my own blood. " I love you –" he punched my face as he said the words again and again, blood spewing everywhere as he broke my nose, cut my skin, bruised me and made me beg for him to stop. "I love you – so – fucking – much!" With every word, he beat me closer to unconsciousness – and to death.}

His voice could lie with such purity and beauty it almost made me believe. It had made me believe him then, and it would make me believe him now, make me remember that…

_It will make me remember that I love him. _

I hated how he still had the power to make me think that I couldn't live without him.

My feet crunched loudly on the glass-covered floor, and it sounded like the crunch of bone under fists. My wand hung loosely in my hand, and my magic pulsed beneath my skin. Soon, I wouldn't be able to keep out of Parseltongue. The power of my magic would explode, and the strength of my spells would increase exponentially.

That was my curse: immeasurable magic and all of the responsibility that came with it. For the thousandth time, I cursed my parentage. I loved them dearly, but Father's battles during the war, the rending of a part of his soul away from the rest when Voldemort died… It had changed him, but it had changed us more.

I heard blood drip on the floor as I neared Malfoy. Hoping his pretty face would scar, I raised my wand to curse him again. "_Sectumsemp_—"

"_Incarcerous!_"

Thick snakes wrapped about me and squeezed. They were pythons – black pythons. Scorpius's favorite snake. It was only then I realized that he had somehow managed to keep his wand with him in the crash and reverse the Silencing charm.

The memories rushed back in again, and I nearly fell to the ground with the weight of past pain and fear.

{ He fell asleep, which was a small mercy. That he was flat on top of me and too heavy to move was not. He was crushing me and I could barely breathe. I didn't dare move, lest he wake up and continue his beating – it would surely kill me this time. I didn't sleep, though my eyes tried to close, and my body demanded rest. I had to be awake to run the second I could. The second he woke, I had to get out of here. This person, this _thing_, was not who I loved. But he had more power over me than Scorpius ever had.

He stirred just a bit on top of me, and my heart leapt in both hope and fear. Could this mean freedom?

His eyes opened slow and fluttering, and it sent pain through me. He looked so much like my Scorpius, but this monster could never be him. My Scorpius had died when he hit me the first time. My Scorpius would never be real again.

He raised himself up and over me on hands and knees and studied me. I had no idea what he was seeing, but no look of regret crossed his beautiful features. There was no remorse, no recognition of wrong – nothing. Just a blank, uncaring expression in his slightly glazed eyes.

And then his eyes became sharp and clear. He studied me, and I saw a look of love and horror in his eyes as he stared at me, bloodied, bruised, and broken on the floor.

He rolled off of me.

I ran. He caught me, and I fought him as hard as I could with broken bones and pain everywhere. But in the end it didn't matter.

"_Incarcerous!_"

I fell to the floor, black pythons twining around me, fear choking me, and pain taking over my mind. The pythons squeezed against every possible bruise, every broken bone. But I wouldn't scream for this monster anymore.

"Lily, you have to listen. You have to believe me love. I would never do this to you under my own control. But last night I… I wasn't under my own control. Lord Sin was controlling me. It was the Imperius Lily. I would never hurt you, I could never hurt you. I love you," he said stroking my hair. "Do you remember what I promised in the beginning baby? Do you remember…"}

"… how I promised to protect you from everything? I would have Lily." He kissed me, and my stomach churned and my skin crawled. "I love you Lily. I would have protected you. I fought. I fought so hard, but Lily, He's like you. His magic explodes, and you get sucked in, and you can't fight. There's no way to fight love." He kissed me again, and I almost threw up. I felt dirty and wrong. I felt like it was my fault. But it wasn't and it never would be. _He_ had hurt _me._

"Do you understand Lily? It wasn't me! I would never hurt you, and I will kill him for what he did to me and for what he did to the way we were. I love you Lily."

He unbound me. "We can go back to how things were now Lily. You don't have to be afraid of him anymore, because I'll protect you. He won't hurt you again." He kissed me one last time.

It broke me. I flipped over, and everything that had been in my stomach came up. He had touched me again, after I had sworn to myself that he never would again. He had been _close enough_ to kiss me. He had said those words again. He had told me… told me that he… that he lov –

_No! I won't listen. I won't let him hurt me. I WON'T!_

"_SECTUMSEMPRA!"_

My magic exploded out of me with that spell. It burst into the air around me, pulsing and alive, roiling and hot, nearly choking me. As the spell launched him backward, a deep bleeding gash opened from his left shoulder to his right hip, and blood poured from the wound.

"Lord Sin? The new Dark Lord? Don't give me that Malfoy! _Sectumsempra!_"

Another gash opened, shallower, from his right temple to the middle of his cheek. It matched perfectly to mine – the only scar I could never hide.

"No excuses Malfoy," I spat. "No more lies. Things will never be the way they were." I rose from my position on the floor, moving slowly to where he had fallen, seeing the blood gathering on his white shirt, a dark accusing line. He still had his wand.

"_Expelliarmus."_ There was a faint clink in the distance as his wand landed somewhere in the shadows of the deserted train car.

Through the silence, the train horn blared. The Hogwarts Express lurched forward, and I stood over my betraying love, hatred in my mind, my eyes, and my magic.

"I will never believe you. The Black Knight isn't real. He doesn't exist. That much evil would have shown itself before now. _You_ hurt me Malfoy. You almost killed me. You beat me for hours. You trapped me like an animal. And now you blame a lie?" My control broke, and I slipped into the hissing spitting tones of Parseltongue. "You will not hurt me again. I will not let you. We were done the second you raised your hand against me."

Our eyes locked. I looked into his silver eyes, and my anger and rage slipped. It fell away until there was only pain and sorrow. There was no way for me to hate him when I loved him. There was no way to forgive him and there was no way to change what was. But I couldn't do this. I couldn't continue to define myself by what had happened. This mess, this anger, this confrontation and useless violence would be the only result.

I knelt next to him, tears falling from my eyes. What we had suffered should never have happened, and it didn't matter who was to blame. The loss of something beautiful and right was what mattered. We still loved each other. But neither of us could live like this.

He kept his gaze locked to mine. I saw the grief in his eyes. I saw the love. I knew that mine reflected his.

I aimed my wand at the cuts on him. Channeling the whole of my magic to him, I cast the strongest healing spells I knew on the cut across his torso. I aimed at the cut marring his perfect face.

"_Episkey_," I cast weakly. I would not let him forget this. When he looked at himself now, with that scar, he would think of me. And maybe he would learn from this.

I tucked my wand away after I'd tended to the cuts from the glass scattered on the floor. We sat in silence as the train droned onward, staring into each other's eyes. I wasn't afraid anymore. I saw how broken he was, and it mirrored the breaks in me. This had changed us both. The lies, the pain, the fear – it didn't matter anymore. We both grieved for what had been perfect. We grieved for the death of the bliss we had had.

"You never once said it Scorpius. Even in your lie, you never once said it." Snake Speak had left me. The rage was gone, and tears fell from my eyes.

His hand reached up and stroked my cheek, over the scar he had left with that very hand. Nothing happened to me. My stomach stayed quiet, my skin felt the same. The only sense I had was of grief and silence.

"I'm sorry Lily. I'm sorry for your pain."

A sob shook me, and once the one had escaped, it all came out. I knelt there weeping with joy and with regret because –

_Because that's what I've always wanted to hear. Those are the words to make me forgive him. And now they're too late._

He pulled me against him, cradling me as he had so many times before. It only made me cry harder. He stroked my hair, and stayed silent.

Eventually the sobbing died down. Day faded to dusk, and I knew that soon my friends would find me. I couldn't be here when they did.

He knew it too. He let me go without a word, but the look in his eyes said enough.

_I love you. I need you._ "I'm so sorry Lily. I will never regret anything more than I regret your pain."

"I know," I whispered, not looking at him. "But it doesn't matter anymore."

It took all the strength I possessed to raise my eyes to his. It took all my will to continue. But I did. He had to know.

"I love you Scorpius."

"Lily, I lov –"

"_Stupefy._"

He slumped gracelessly to the floor. I checked him one last time for cuts and bruises, healed what I found, and brought him to a shadowed corner of a populated room. I left him there, amongst his Slytherin peers, and I went back to where I belonged.

I went back to my friends and even then I was alone.

* * *

><p><strong>Rose<strong>

I was frantic – all of us were. He'd disappeared with Lily and after what he had done to her – what he would do again if there was no one to stop him – it was terrifying to know he was with her god-only-knows where. We had to find her.

We'd searched every place he could have possibly taken her at least 10 times. The entire train even, except the dilapidated back cars. He would never take her there. They were nowhere. It was like they'd disappeared for real – vanished into thin air. And with Lady Raven the Seer following me, there was almost no hope of staying positive.

"Where are you where are you where are you," I chanted again and again. I had to find her. I had to find Lily before he damaged her more and broke her for good.

"Rose. We cannot interfere with this. This is what they need. This is their fate and –"

I almost slapped Raven as I whirled. "Don't give me that Raven! I _know_ you See things and I _know_ you've Seen this. But damn fate and damn the future! I _will not_ let him hurt again. I'll die first."

I turned and continued my search. I barely heard Raven's whisper.

"Rose."

I kept walking. I wouldn't let her convince me there was no chance for finding Lily.

"Rose please," she said, voice trembling.

_Crying won't work. Don't let her stop you Rose._ I kept walking.

She gasped and it sounded like a scream. I heard a thunk as she fell to the floor. I whirled and the sight that caught my eyes scared me more than I'd ever been afraid before.

Raven's eyes were engulfed in black. The glowed with a throbbing dance of colors and her back was arching impossibly. Her head rolled from side to side, hair swirling like an inky cloud in a wind that touched only her.

She was Seeing something. This was a vision.

She screamed like a banshee. I didn't think, didn't feel fear. I ran to her, kept her head still, called for help. There was no one near enough to hear.

She went stiff as a board, and her hands shot to mine. I'd never know there was so much strength in her grip, but it felt like she was breaking bones. I couldn't hear anything but the sound of her sliding ethereal voice.

"_The blackest sin has come to pass,_

_Intent on breaking down the glass,_

_Of spells divide and boundaries plain,_

_Ensuring all who live are slain._

_Evil horrors of before,_

_Outdone and mocked fore'er more._

_The once-protectors blind by fear_

_The new defenders short in years. _

_The death of all decreed by Fate,_

_The greatest hope destroyed by hate,_

_The Eden hidden and undone_

_Of darkened Daughter and shining Son._

_The symbol of two black wands crossed_

_The only sign when all is lost, _

_And only to the Lover Wands _

_Is it that Light in Dark responds."_

She slumped back, and her hands released me. She stayed too still, unbreathing, for and eternal second. Then her eyes blinked open, their normal sage green returned, and she smiled.

"Did you hear it all?"

I stared at her in shock and nodded automatically.

"Do you remember it all?"

I nodded again, unable to speak.

"Tell me."

I did.

She blinked a few times, and her expression clouded with something akin to trepidation, reluctance, and fear.

"Dark times lie in store for us all." She looked over to her right, and something caught her vision. "There is a burden only you can carry Lily."

I snapped my head to where she was looking, and to my shock, Lily was there, nearer than I had thought and silent as the grave. She dropped to a crouch before Raven, and they gazed at each other for the longest time.

"How many will die if I fail Raven?" Her voice shot shivers down my spine, but it was Raven's reply that made me afraid.

"The ones that don't will be the ones to suffer."

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: Chapter 3: The Eyes of the Monster


	3. The Eyes of the Monster

**Chapter 3: The Eyes of the Monster**

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

The Great Hall was glorious, like a welcoming home. The candles burned brightly and the flames danced in the warm air, shifting on every twist of air. The students chattered noisily, and the stone walls both amplified and smothered the din. At the high table the teachers sat, keeping a close eye on the students below. Headmistress McGonagall was stiff in her chair, brimming with stern pride as she watched the young boys and girls below. And above it all, the spelled ceiling reflected the perfect starred night outside the safety and shelter of the castle. It was comforting, a safe connection with nature. But it reminded the wizards and witches below that safety was not always sure.

It didn't comfort me. Not this time, not after my encounter with Malfoy on the train.

The Christmas before everything went south, the winter break before the… the beating, on the very last night of term, Scorpius had taken me out under the stars, between the Quidditch pitch and the castle. We'd used my father's invisibility cloak to get around the guards, and as midnight came and went, Scorpius and I… We'd…

_We'd made love._

No. We'd had sex. There was no love in it, that much was clear to me when I looked back. I should bloody well know that Malfoy hadn't loved me. Or he hadn't loved me enough to keep from hurting me. Malfoy couldn't love. Scorpius could, but he was long dead. There was nothing left of the Scorpius I had known.

_He walks the same. He talks the same. But no one else sees it, do they? They don't see how he's changed. He's the same person, and yet there's nothing the same about him._

We'd both been too young. Neither of us had been ready. Neither of us had seen far enough into the future to see that no matter what, it would end. Neither of us had cared to look.

{ "We'll be together forever Lily," he'd said as we cuddled together after… after we'd finished. He held me close and whispered to me. It was beautiful and perfect, and I knew he was right.

"And now, no matter how far apart we are, we'll always be under the same stars together," he'd promised. "No matter what, we'll always be together." }

_What a beautiful lie._

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

"RAVENCLAW!" The bloody hat's yell drew my eyes to the table, and I saw the newest Weasley being welcomed by the Longbottom girl next to Lily.

She was thinking and staring at the ceiling – the blasted bloody starry ceiling. I knew exactly what she was thinking about too, and I wished she would damn well stop. I knew how she viewed that night now, and I hated it.

"SLYTHERIN!" Screams and clapping erupted around me. I glared harder at the line of first years between us and the Hufflepuffs.

"If you keep glaring at the first years, mate, Professor Salzane will have you in detention for weeks. You know how he dearly loves to have the first scare himself," drawled Mikael Zabini to my left.

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

_I hate everything. I let her get away again. She bloody well knew I wouldn't hurt her, and she still bested me._

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Scorpius. It's the first day. Drink your pumpkin juice and be happy," trilled Violet Parkinson to my right.

"RAVENCLAW!" The name brought up every happy memory of Lily I had.

_It tastes like ash and it won't go down. I can't sleep, I can't eat, I can barely breathe sometimes. Yet she goes on happy and healthy and perfect as always. Am I the only one living a bloody hell? How can she know she loves me and still –_

"Medusos Malfoy," announced Headmistress McGonogall. The mention of my little brother and his Sorting shocked me out of my brooding thoughts. I had always loved my little brother, and this was a monumental moment in his life. Our parents had always been somewhat distant and civil, if rather unloving. We'd banded together because we both needed love from someone. Medusos was one of the brightest parts of my life.

He lacked all of the Malfoy grace and restraint as he shuffled worriedly to the stool and the Sorting Hat. He had owled me with his fears about the Sorting. He was afraid that mother and father would disown him if he didn't make it into Slytherin. He thought that I wouldn't love him either.

He was wrong of course. While Medusos was not the heir of the Malfoys, he was the heir to all the significant estates of my mother's family, the Greengrasses. They would never disown an heir, nor would they consider letting a child of their's away from them. My parents were distant, they were harsh, and they were cold. They were not very affectionate. But blood runs thicker than galleons and Houses, and even dignity and grace. They were loyal, and they were fiercely protective, Father especially. It was a product of the War.

Medusos sat on the stool, and shifted a bit uncomfortably. The hat was taking a surprisingly long time to sort him, and I knew it would be compounding his fears. He raised his hand to his mouth and started chewing at his nails – a very un-Malfoy-like gesture, but one I had always found endearing. He looked like a nervous golden cherubim on his stool, his pale blond hair leaning toward warmer golden tones, his entire body almost drowned out by the Sorting Hat. He was not lean like the rest of my family. He still had some of the childlike roundness in his cheeks, and all over his body. He was by no means overweight (father kept us on a strict eating and exercising regiment), but he held a sort of healthy, well-fed glow around him. His eyes were shocking blue rather than my slashing silver, and he was very small. He had earned himself the name of "Sweetheart" from a very young age. Older ladies compared him to a quite-dashing doll, and girls his age found him adorable, kind and chivalrous. He never failed to be charming or polite. In fact, he worked extremely hard to make those around him smile at every opportunity.

Still, the Sorting Hat had not announced where my little brother would go. He squirmed in his seat, and I could see his dangling foot tapping rapidly where it hung above the floor. He had forgone his nails, and was instead looking straight at me. Still, the Hat was silent.

The last time I had seen him this nervous and frightened had been when Mum and Father had been fighting over whether or not to have more children. My mum wanted more kids, a whole house full of them to fill the halls of the Manor with laughter. My Father, who knew about my mother's delicate health, had told her flatly that there would be no more children after Medusos. After my birth, my mother had been ill for months, her weak constitution unable to handle the stress of labor. We had nearly lost her as she gave birth to Medusos. That labor had been more difficult. She had nearly died many times, and it took her a full year and a half to recover completely.

My father would never admit to it – but my Mum was the love of his life. Their relationship was hard, they did not agree on many things, they fought continuously. But losing her would surely break him where nothing else could. Each time he relived the memory of her near death in labor, the fear haunted him again. There were nights when I heard him wake up screaming in their bed for the terror and pain it had caused him.

That day, that fight about children, had been terrifying for Medusos. Not only had Father ordered us out of the room, but he had screamed and ranted, thrown things and stormed around the dining room we had been having breakfast in.

He had called Medusos a mistake, a child that should have never been. He loved Medusos, but it was nothing compared to his love for my mum.

Medusos had burst into tears when he heard that. Father's approval was something he had always wanted and never gotten. He held in the sounds of sobbing very well, and neither of my parents had found us listening in on their conversation. Medusos hadn't stopped shaking for days. He had been nervous to see Father again, terrified that he didn't love him, that he had done something wrong and Father was punishing him for it. He had been nearly paralyzed by fear at the thought of our parents splitting up. It was the one time that they had come close to divorce.

Medusos hadn't left my side. He barely ever let me go. I loved him all the more for it. His innocence, his fear, his selflessness – it made him a speck of light in the midst of the dark chill that encompassed our family.

I wasn't surprised when I heard the Sorting Hat finally shout out it's judgement on him. It was where he belonged.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Medusos paled, and his eyes flew to mine, shocked and terrified. I smiled at him. He was brave. He was pure. He was noble. I hated the Lions. Butit would be an honor to have Medusos in their House. He would make us proud.

My brother never looked away from me as he walked, slow and hesitant, toward the Gryffindor table. He sat down in the first available seat, the one closest to the High Table and the safety of the teachers.

He was immediately joined by the oldest Weasley girl. She hugged him, welcomed him to the house, and even eventually drew his attention away from my reassuring smile. She was a mother hen, Lily's friend.

_Lily…_

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

_I wish he'd never come into my world_, I thought, staring at the starry ceiling. _If he hadn't, neither of us would have been hurt. Neither of us would have lost something._

"RAVENCLAW!"

Little Madeline Weasley ran over to the Ravenclaw table so fast she almost tripped and fell on her face. Raven caught her before she could, but it didn't stop her happy momentum. I watched her bouncing in her seat, gave her a big hug and smiled. She was only eleven. She didn't need to know what had happened, and she didn't need sadness to touch her right now. Let her enjoy the glory of Hogwarts while it lasted.

There was silence from the Sorting Hat for a long while – long enough to draw my attention away from my sour mood. I looked up to the dais where the Hat and stool sat, and I was shocked at what I saw.

I had only met Medusos Malfoy once, and the moment I had, I'd known he was an angel. His mother and father had allowed him to visit Scorpius in Hogsmeade one weekend, and I had spent the day with them both. He had held my hand, led me from store to store and told me Scorpius's embarrassing secrets. He'd stolen sips of my Butterbear when he thought I wasn't looking and his sheer joy in being with his "Big Brother Scory", learning new places and trying new things had made me smile and laugh with him. I had never had such a spectacular time with a child, nor had I seen such goodness in one place before. I could only imagine that Medusos was the light and joy of his family.

I was a bit shocked when the Hat cried, "GRYFFINDOR!"

But I suppose, with what I had seen of the little angel, I shouldn't have been. Gryffindor was a lucky house indeed.

I watched Rose welcome him, accept him into the fold, and soon he was smiling and laughing again. The look of happiness on his face was beautiful to see, but something was off about it. There was uncertainty in his gaze, and his eyes flicked over to the other side of the hall every so often.

It wasn't hard to tell who he was looking at. He'd always sought reassurance from his brother.

I looked to the older Malfoy and memories, both blissful and biting, flooded me. I pushed them away.

He was as beautiful as ever. His platinum hair fell perfectly across the side of his handsome face. His eyes were sharp and silver; they could slash a person to shreds and make them feel like flying. His entire form was lean and toned. He had never been brawny, and never would be, but there was no doubt he was strong. Strong enough to show no fear, strong enough to hold me like a child. Scorpius was strong enough to…

_To break 6 of your ribs, your arm, your hand, your nose, your leg, bruise and bloody every inch of you and never break a sweat. He's not Scorpius. Scorpius isn't a monster._

The memories rushed in, and my eyes snapped to his, caught and held.

I couldn't breathe. I couldn't move. I couldn't think. His eyes had gone distant and glazed, seemingly in memory. It was the same look he'd had during the attack. Those eyes sent cold fear flooding through me. Frigid sweat rolled down my spine, and the noise of the hall faded. My entire world centered on him.

My wand was out a second after my heart started its frightened thrum. A spell sat heavy on the tip of my tongue, but I was too afraid, too late. I sat helpless as a broken bird, caught in the stare of a hunting snake.

My wand fell back into my sleeve sheath. Time slowed, I curled inward, and tears pricked a sharp sting in my eyes. I was cowering before him again, the fight draining from me as every horrible feeling smothered my logical mind.

Someone was calling me, shaking me, but it didn't matter. All that I could see was those slashing silver eyes across the Hall as they cut away every strong part of me.

Something shifted then in those horrid chilling eyes. They warmed from silver to a stormy gray, and I could see the conflict in him. The glaze in his eyes was fading in and out, and when it cleared I saw something almost… guilty.

_What does it mean? Why is he guilty now? Why not before? Why didn't he stop when he heard me scream again and again?_

It haunted me, for the rest of dinner. He haunted me. I clapped when I needed to, pretended to listen, even ate the food that tasted like ash and clung to my mouth like something foul.

This place had once given me some peace. Hogwarts had been an escape from the painful memories and the lessons and the history that came with who my family and I were. Now it seemed like a tomb.

Flashes of memory showed before my eyes all through dinner, and I had only the vaguest idea of why. I trembled and curled into myself and altogether forgot that there was anything besides the memories of that night. I'd thought that confronting him would help me heal, not rip open the wounds I'd been working so long to hide.

_Not hide. Heal Lily. You're healing. Not hiding. You're a Potter. Potters don't hide. They heal._

I whimpered a little at the very thought.

Healing was so hard, so painful, so long. It brought everything to the surface again and bombarded you with the reality and the ugliness of the wound itself. It was so much easier to cover, to force away. It was easier to pretend it didn't exist, and I was so tired of doing things the hard way.

Someone touched my shoulder, in the exact place where some of the gouges from Scorpius's nails were. I whimpered at the contact, curling further into myself as tears rushed to my eyes. Was it him? Was he here to end it this time?

"Lily?" came Raven's serene voice, "Lily, the feast is over, and everyone's being sent off to bed. We need to get back to the dormitories. Rose's been given special permission to stay with us this year, remember?"

I did remember, in some vague part of my mind. But the forefront, the writhing mass of painful and blissful memories, stole away any focus I had. I felt two sets of hands on me, pulling me up from the bench, and then my feet were moving, and were climbing, and all I could do was let the memories come and hope that I wasn't sobbing yet.

The trip to our room was an eon and a second. With every step, a thousand more thoughts and memories pushed their way into my mind, and yet compared to how long the unfocused throb of memories lasted, the trip was only a second, insignificant and unnoticed. They laid me on my bed, and it was only then, surrounded by softness and comfort, warm bodies and soothing words, and away from the cold, harsh stone of the floors and the walls, that the fog of remembrances began to fade.

" – _told_ you that we couldn't trust him Raven! Look at what he's done to her! When I get my hands on him, there won't be a spell I don't use. I'll pay him back for every ounce of torment he's inflicted upon her. I'll -"

"Rose," Raven interrupted softly, "Anger will do nothing for her in this state. Her mind is breaking down from holding this in too long. She needs to let it go. She needs to feel safe, and she needs someone to just listen. Anger will only add to the pain and fear. She'll only be able to associate you with him."

At this, Rose was outraged. She spluttered, and all I could think was that she was the hot fire edge to Raven's soft, gentle coolness.

"No Rose. Shut that infamous mouth of yours and just listen for once. This isn't about you. This isn't about revenge. This isn't about your ridiculous feelings of inadequacy."

_I never knew Raven had this much spine_, I thought, but the word just brought up the memories of being tied down against cold stone, helpless, naked, back being crushed and ground into the rock until I bled…

"This is about healing her. Look at her Rose! She's breaking and fraying and anger will do nothing but make more fear and wounds. She needs to talk."

"No, Raven, we need to do something. We need to drag him out of his dungeons and expose this. Make them see who he really is, how he's treated her. Make him pay!"

Raven started gently stroking my hair, massaging my scalp, and I knew that she knew that I was cognizant and fighting through the memories.

"Exposure Rose? Split the school straight down the middle, bring in more conflict and fighting and pain? Yes, that's certainly ideal for helping Lily heal. That's what she needs – a war raging on around her about the attack when there's another, greater war on the way? Heal pain with more pain, more memories, more questions? No Rose. That's not how you heal wounds to the mind and wounds to the soul. Revenge breeds hate, and Lily needs love."

She cupped my cheeks gently in her hands and kissed my forehead, all the while with that calm, knowing, slightly absent air she had, though I knew her attention was centered wholly on me.

She shushed me, and I realized I was whimpering a bit. I didn't know when I'd gotten so weak, but whatever strength I'd had was gone and wouldn't return.

"You can help her Rose. If you'd just calm down and sit down and work with me, we both can help Lily. She needs to talk about this. Can you listen? Not talk, not plot, just listen and hold her and cry with her?"

There was a moment of silence, except for the faint shushing nose that Raven's hands made as she stroked my hair, and then the comforter and bed on my other side sank down with Rose's weight. Another hand joined Raven's, this one rubbing my back, and I couldn't help the tears anymore.

I sobbed, probably for hours, and they just held me and cried with me and tried to keep me supplied with handkerchiefs and tissues. And once the tears were gone, and the silence had returned, and I felt empty and drained and ready to loosen the stranglehold I'd held on everything, I began to speak.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: A Fear-Stalked Silence


	4. A FearStalked Silence

**Warning**: This chapter contains graphic scenes of brutality, abuse, torture, and rape. If this is a problem for you, don't read anything between the **Warning** page breaks.

**Chapter Four: A Fear-Stalked Silence**

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

"I think I've known Scorpius, somehow, from the time I was six or seven, although I never met him until I was 10. His father, Draco Malfoy, came to Papa one day. I don't know why.

"I was playing by the door, making the dolls Mother had Transfigured fly. He was in the distance, and I didn't see him at first. My magic was released, and it was spinning and whirling and expanding all around me. I still didn't have complete control over it at that point. I was only a child, but Mother and Papa had already taught me I could never, never, have all my magic out around strangers. The strangers would try to take me away from them, they said, try to take me away and steal my magic and raise something evil, like the thing that Papa had had to fight.

"I believed them. I had seen cruelty in strangers, and Albus and James had both been taught the same thing. They'd even had some experience with it. They told me the same thing, especially Albus, because he always worried about me.

"I didn't see him coming though, not until he was close enough to feel the waves of magic. I… He scared me, and I hit him in the face with a doll on accident to try and keep him from seeing me. It just made him angry. He grabbed my shoulder in a vice grip, and he had his wand out of his cane and pointed at me before I had a chance to run two steps.

"He terrified me, but I couldn't look away from those silver eyes. His magic was aggressive, trying to push mine away, and he was growling something about 'the Dark Lord's mark on me'. I didn't learn until I was older that he was talking about the imprint left on my dad's magic, and then passed down to me. It's unusual for magic to share imprints of others through the bloodline, but my dad did something almost cataclysmic, and cataclysm leaves it's mark.

"Mr. Malfoy held me like that for a few seconds, and I started crying, and this… this shift took place, and suddenly his eyes looked like Papa's or Albus'. He didn't look mad anymore, he just looked like he wanted to keep me safe. He set me down, and he smoothed my hair down, and he told me not to cry. He handed me back my doll, and he apologized, and then he went into the house to meet with Papa for something. I didn't see him leave, but I knew he did, because the house stopped feeling like strange magic before I went to bed.

"That look in his eyes… it's how Scorpius looked at me before the… before it happened. He used to get so protective of me, tried to keep me from tripping or getting parchment cuts or dripping ink on myself when I got caught up in reading… I first met Scorpius in his father's eyes."

I turned over from my side, laying on my back and staring and the blue canopy, connecting the silver stars on it with my eyes to try and keep focused when I just wanted to cry again. I had to keep talking. If I ever stopped, it felt like I would never start again.

"Mr. Malfoy came back a few times, but he never came near me again. I knew he didn't like my magic, but Papa had scared him off of me after he saw the bruise on my shoulder. I never forgot that look though, and after that my favorite color was the silver of his eyes.

"I officially met Scorpius on Platform 9 ¾ when I went to school a year early. I'd been in a terrible row with Papa because he didn't want me to go a year early, though I knew that I could handle it. It was right after my magic had exploded out of me, when I touched the signet ring Papa had from Grandpapa. He'd found out I was the heir of my family's magic, even though I was the youngest and a girl. Papa didn't want me to go because he thought it was too dangerous and he didn't want me to be teased for being so small, and he didn't think I was ready, and he thought I needed more time to regain my control. All I could hear was 'you aren't old enough, or man enough, or big enough, or tough enough, or smart enough, and above all, you don't have enough willpower to keep yourself reigned in'. I was so mad, and I yelled at him, even though I'd never yelled at him before. I used the Floo for the first time that day, to get to King's Cross Station and onto the train, because Mother hadn't acknowledged me in years, and Papa was so angry. I got separated from the people I'd followed through the wall, and I couldn't see over anyone, and I couldn't get up high enough to see which way was which. I was so small when I was ten, and the crowds were bumping me around, and I was scared. And then I caught just the barest flash of my favorite silver color, and I followed it because it was the only thing I recognized. They were his eyes, those same exact eyes that I'd seen years ago, except they were in a younger person.

"Scorpius had been dropped off, as 'it wasn't appropriate for a Malfoy to be seen clinging to his parents, or the parents to be hovering over the child'. He was about to get onto the train when…" I laughed at how ridiculous this was, "Well, when I grabbed him and slung my arms around his waist and held on for the life of me. I dropped my trunk right in front of his feet, and he tripped and fell and it was horrible. But he shifted while he was falling so that he didn't fall on me, and he landed right on his bum in the gap between the platform and the train, and he nearly slipped through. He pushed me out of the way, and he managed to get out of there with a bit of a struggle.

"He didn't even stop to look at me when he got up. He pushed me back as hard as he could, and even though I was small, he was_ big_, and it was a lot of force. I landed right flat on my back and he just walked away…

"And I did what any respectable young lady would do at that point. I stood up, and I took off my shoe, and I threw it at his head, and then I went about dusting off my brand new robes, because they were dirty and I was angry and crying and now my shoe was gone.

"But it wasn't gone, because as soon as I'd finished getting the dust off my bum and hem, he was right there in front of me. He was close as could be, and like I said, he was big. Nearly twice my height at the time. He put my shoe back on for me, and he set my trunk down by my feet, and he kissed the little cut on the palm of my hand that I hadn't seen before.

"And then he was gone, and I didn't see him for the rest of my first year.

"I made friends of course, even though I was a year younger and tiny. I met you Rose, and we got to be fast friends, and then Raven found me, and Aleksander and Dimitri. It was a good year, but he puzzled me the entire time. I knew he had to be Mr. Malfoy's son, because he just looked too much like him to be anything else. But I could never find him in Ravenclaw or Gryffindor. With manners like that, and that gallantry, he had to be either a reckless, charming Gryffindor, or a polite Ravenclaw. I never thought to look below the Towers. If I'd known he was in Slytherin… But we didn't have any classes with them, all year.

"And then, in second year, I had all my classes with Slytherin. Every single one of them. And in every single one, he was there, though he never looked at me, and he never talked to me. I was still tiny then. I wouldn't hit my growth spurt until that summer. The other kids teased me, called me all sorts of names, kicked me and pretended they hadn't seen me… but it got less and less, and I caught him glaring at the others every so often. I knew he'd done something, but I couldn't understand why he wouldn't just talk to me.

"But that year passed too, and nothing happened. He was just the silent, shining son of Mr. Malfoy with those silver eyes and platinum hair. He confused me. But he was an interesting puzzle, and I played the little game of deciphering him so I'd have something I could do. Something to think about when my classes bored me to tears.

"And then it was third year, and I'd grown so much, and I was almost as big as the boys. There was Quidditch, and there were new classes, harder classes that I could actually be made to think in, and there was Hogsmeade, and I forgot about my befuddling silver knight. Scorpius faded between the endless essays and practices and shopping trips and excitement. I dropped the puzzle I'd found in him and it didn't even hurt to let it go.

"But that was the year he found me."

I rolled over again, until I could rest my head on the pillows, trying to assure myself I was stable for what came next.

"I remember that game against Slytherin, to get into finals, in third year. I was center Chaser. We were all of two goals away from putting it out of Slytherin's reach even with the Snitch, and I had the Quaffle to score. It was the perfect shot, and I was weaving and diving and spinning and evading like mad. Everything was so clear, and the keeper was off on the other side of the hoops because the distraction was actually working and Mary Bones was flying spectacularly.

"But then the bludger came. It was a dirty shot. The Beater handed his club off to one of their Chasers. Of course, Hooch couldn't see him, because the tangle was insane.

"It hit me square in the back of the skull as I was shooting up out of the crush. I was out in a second, so they say, falling from 300 feet in the air. No one saw me on the field. Not the Beaters, not the Chasers, not even Albus. He was racing with Scorpius for the Snitch, and Slytherin would still be ten points up if they caught the Snitch now. No one saw me falling except the people in the stands, or so they told me.

"The Snitch was down low, not 10 feet off the ground. They were neck in neck, and he could have gotten it if it hadn't jumped straight up. Albus and Scorpius shot up after it, and I fell right past them. Albus didn't even notice. He was too focused. Scorpius had the Snitch though. Just an inch more and he would have gotten it.

"He didn't. He flipped over on his broom, and he dove straight towards the ground. He raced that bloody broom with all the strength he had, straight at the ground.

"He was the only one who saw me falling. He gave up the Snitch to catch me. I might have survived the fall. Someone probably would have noticed in time. But he dove straight for the ground, and he caught me not 10 feet from the the grass of the pitch, right by the wall. He fell off his broom, and I have no idea how he did it, but he must have wrapped himself around me to protect me. We fell through the rafters in the pit between the stands and the fields, and he got banged up as hell.

"Broken ribs, they said when he got to the hospital wing. A broken wrist, ankle, finger, three fractured vertebrae, and cuts and bruises all over him from the fifty foot fall through the rafters. They put me on the bed next to him. I woke up in another 10 minutes. He didn't wake up for three days.

"I stayed with him all three days. I couldn't eat, couldn't sleep… nothing. I had no idea why, but it centered on him. He fascinated me, how he could come after me when he didn't know me. He wasn't beautiful, he wasn't interesting or funny or conversant at that point. For all I knew, when he woke up, he'd be a vegetable. But I couldn't leave him.

"When he woke up, he didn't say a word to me, and I didn't say a word to him outside of a heartfelt 'thank you'. And we didn't talk for the rest of the year. I tried to send him an owl over summer, but I never got a response back.

"And in fourth year, there was the Triwizard tournament, and Scorpius had to compete even though he was too young. I tried to talk to him for the first time, to warn him about the first task. The Slytherins wouldn't let me near him. 'What could the Lady Ravenclaw want with one of the snakes? Go play with your riddles little girl. Scorpius Malfoy has no need for children'. I didn't get to him in time to be much help, but I did manage to warn him on the walk down to the Champion's tent.

"He didn't believe that they'd have to fight their way through a nundu. The Headmistress wouldn't sentence them to death like that. No one had every managed to slay a nundu with less than a hundred wizards. 'Impossible,' he'd said, 'Nundus are nearly impossible to kill, and they're deadly to anything that crosses their paths. There's no way they'd ever risk bringing one to Hogwarts, much less pit us against them. Don't be ridiculous.'

"Normally, that wouldn't bother me, but with him, I learned that every insult, every barb, every_thing_ is more. When it's something good, it makes me fly. When it's bad, it kills me slowly; worse yet, there's nothing I can do about it. For as long as I live, he'll affect me like that.

"But that's not what I'm on about right now is it? No, of course not. The depressing parts come later." I laughed, and it was hollow and thin and wrong. There was no happiness in it.

"Then they heard the nundu roar. They called the champions out, and there it was."

Silence rang throughout the room as we all remembered the battle. The roars, the screams, the overwhelming stench of desperation and fear washed over us all again. The memories blinded us all to the present, and the sheer terror of the day threatened to steal our breathe away forever.

"He almost died," I said, and that murmur sounded like the shattering of glass. "So many times, he almost died, and each and every time, it felt like my heart stopped and bled for him. I didn't know why. He'd made no promises, shared nothing with me. We'd barely ever spoken to each other, and yet...

"And yet, every time he was close to death, I felt like I would die with him. Like if his soul left, mine would follow. I couldn't name what it was then. But it was something that went deeper than blood and bone and everything. Something deeper than love.

"He came out bloody, bruised, broken, drained of magic and so many other things. They took him to the hospital wing, and he stayed there for two whole weeks. He would only let one person see him. He'd only let me in.

"I helped him with figuring out the second task, up until the time that the Headmistress took me and gave me the poisoned batch of the Draught of Living Death. I only figured out, after he saved me, that I was taken because I meant the most to him. Scorpius told me, after he'd administered the antidote - 12 minutes after the point when it should have killed me mind you - that after the entire mess was over, after the challenges were won and everything was healed, that he had something he needed to tell me, something that would change everything.

"And then there was the race through the castle, the hunt for the Cup through the rooms filled with every horrible, evil thing. Boggarts and Dementors, Acromantula and Dragons, creatures I can't even name. They started in the dungeons, and the Cup was on the roof of the Astronomy Tower. He battled through all of it, and he managed to win it.

"And then he fell from the top of the Astronomy Tower. He'd lost over 2 liters of blood, and his core was sapped of magic. He'd been battling for seven hours, and he'd been through hell and worse in that castle. His mind, his body... everything was close enough to death for there to be no difference.

"He fell, and I watched him, and all I could think was - No. I wouldn't let him die. I refused to let him die.

"The fall from the top of the Tower is over 300 feet. It takes a long time to fall that far, but it didn't seem like long enough. I could swear, before I caught him, that he was inches away from the ground. It was far enough away in reality, but the fear was ridiculous. I'd thought I'd lost him before I'd even had him. Fear changes things. It shifts perspectives and it clouds judgements. I hate fear.

"I don't know how it happened exactly. Some people say I flew, some say it was Apparation into midair, and others think I'd somehow charmed my broom invisible. But it wasn't that. It was my magic, focused on a single thing, one purpose, so wholly that nothing stood in my way.

"It was terrifying and I'd do it a thousand times over to save Scorpius again. But the feeling of all my magic, centering and shifting around one thing, focused so harshly that there was no escape - it's the worst feeling I've ever had, and I still have night terrors and cold-sweats about it. I hate my magic. It's tainted and evil, and it stems from the vilest creature to ever walk this earth. And I can feel a piece of that aberration, of Voldemort, trying to devour me every time my magic rears it's ugly head from the dark place I manage to hide it in. It sickens me.

"Is it wrong that I'd give into it? That I'd give into the Dark, just to save one man? It's monstrous. It's evil. I'd damn everything just for him. What does that make me?

"But then, what does it matter what I am? It means bloody nothing anymore. I have to try to fix the damage he's done. I'm his after all. He's the only one who'd take me now.

"But I caught him. I saved him, and I broke the one rule my parents had drilled into me since I was born. My magic was out and swirling and flying, and everyone could see it dance and destroy, and everyone knew I was tainted. I just wanted to curl up and die from the looks I would get. But I didn't regret a thing. I didn't regret saving Scorpius for a single second.

"Over summer, we exchanged letters every day. We snuck out through the Floo to see each other when we could, lied to our parents about where we were going so we could be together. Before we'd left, we'd bought a pair of charmed mirrors so that we could talk and see each other. And while he was reserved because his parents supervised him constantly, and I... well, because I'm not a fantastic conversationalist, we got to know each other better than I think I've known anyone before. I told him about my magic, and he told me about the side effects of being raised in a house wrought with Dark magic when he's so susceptible to it, and I told him about the Parseltongue, and he told me about his little brother Medusos, and I taught him Parseltongue, and he somehow managed to learn it because of his family's close connection to Voldemort, and he talked me down from my rages and up from my depression and... we fell in love.

"And then last year, when the school year came, we got together. I remember threatening people out of my way at wandpoint to get into his compartment on the train. We spent the entire ride talking and staring and touching each other. It was sweet and chaste and innocent, and he just kept me in his arms the entire train ride, like it was the most natural, proper thing in the world to do. He didn't do anything bold, didn't try to molest me. He just sat with his back against the door and held me while we looked out the window at the countryside, and we talked.

"Of course, once we got into the carriages to go up to the castle, with closed doors and covered windows and no possible interruptions, it turned into a right snog that lasted the entire way to the castle. But I started that, not him. He was always a perfect gentleman, unless I started something... bold.

"The entire year was bliss. It was perfect and wonderful, filled with laughter and joy and everything I'd ever hoped for, on the rare occasions when I imagined what it would be like to be in love. Things were working out, and I finally felt like I didn't have to be afraid of breaking the rules or disappointing my family, or hiding my magic, or getting the best grades, or protecting everyone. The world wasn't about responsibilities and duties and working and trying and achieving anymore. It was about getting by and making a place for Scorpius and myself. We could just tell that we were each other's futures. You always said, Raven, that there was a touch of destiny about us.

"And then he started talking about Lord Sin.

"At first, I thought it was like a child's ghost story, meant to scare and entertain at the same time. But he believed it, and he said that his left arm burned in time with his pulse. After we first discovered the Room of Requirement and we started spending nights together, I'd see red, irritated scratches on his left arm in the shape of a skull and a snake. I thought he was scratching the Dark Mark on himself to try and make the story more real. It seemed like he was becoming obsessed, like it was some sort of bloody game to him. He was getting stranger and stranger, more distant and I... I was scared. I thought I was losing him, to someone else, to himself, to his strange fascination with that abominable story about 'another darkness rising in the world'. I talked to him about it, fought with him, tried to get him to stop, and all he could go on about was blood and his connection to this abhorrent idea of 'Lord Sin'.

"I thought it was finally over that night three weeks after Christmas. He came into the Room of Requirement, and he was so focused on me. He didn't talk about the mark or the blood or the stupid fake Lord once. It was like the time on the train. We sat, and he held me, and we talked.

"I said 'I'm so glad to have you back. You're finally the Scorpius Malfoy I know again'. It was like a flip switched in him.

"He shifted so fast. I barely had time to realize something had changed before he slammed my head down into the floor. He held me down by the neck and squeezed the air out of my lungs. I tried to get to my wand, but the second it was in my hand, it was gone again. I heard a sickening snap of wood, and then he threw the pieces of it across the room. He told me to...

**Warning**

* * *

><p>{... "Scream, bitch, or I'll kill you. Scream for me." He bashed my head into the floor again and again, until I couldn't see through the blood in my eyes, and my brain was too scrambled to know how to do anything more than breathe.<p>

"I - Said - SCREAM BITCH!" He punched me in the face hard enough to break bone, straddling my thighs so I couldn't get away. The pain was incomprehensible, and I couldn't catch my breath. Couldn't think, couldn't breathe, couldn't move as my bones snapped and blood spurted.

He hit me again and again in the face and throat. He strangled me until I was on the verge of passing out, and then he'd let me breathe only to start again.

And somehow, the sight of me turning blue and nearly unconscious, choked and helpless did something for him, and the attack turned from a beating into rape. He flipped me over, and I saw a knife glint in his hand just before he sliced my robes off of me, piece by piece, until all my skin was exposed. I was naked and alone and hurting and terrified. He just kept hitting me.

"You like that, don't you?" he said as he drew the knife across the tops of my breasts. "You like it when I hurt you, don't you slut? You love pain. Well, see how this feels bitch!"

He wrapped a hand around my throat, and for a second it was gentle, almost tender. And then the knife was there, drawing a line across my throat. There was an unimaginable pain, a tearing, wrenching agony, but more than that was the terror of being completely unprotected and vulnerable to a monster. I could feel the power he held over me. He could kill me, and no one would know. No one knew where I was, nor where he was. I could disappear, and he'd be gone before they ever found me.

His hand tightened until it was near crushing my throat, and his hand squelched in my blood as it bubbled up around his fingers, red and wrong. My vision tunneled, the edges fading from black to gray, and all I could think was, _What did I do? What did I do wrong?_

I clawed at his hands, tried to get away, kicked him and punched him and flailed and squirmed. He held me there until I passed out, slicing my skin all the while.

When I woke again, I was tied in the center of the room, hanging from the ceiling, toes barely touching the ground. He had the knife in one hand and a whip in the other.

"Do you like pain, slut?" He asked. I tried to cry or scream for help, anything, though my throat was raw and bleeding. It did nothing. He'd gagged me, and what little sound I could make could only be heard by me.

"ANSWER ME BITCH!" he roared, and when no sound came from me, he swung the whip across the top of my breasts, right over the cut he'd made, slicing through my skin and taking pieces with it. The whip was barbed, and it tore flesh from bone. The pain shot through me, a sharp agony that didn't even warrant a scream. There were too many wounds for it to make any difference.

His shirt came off then, though I only realized because I could see the shadow of something on his left forearm, just before the whip cracked down across my back. Blood ran in rivulets down my body, and I almost welcomed it. Maybe if I died, the pain would end.

The whip tore off my skin again and again as things blurred together. There was an endless sea of torture, and I was in the middle of it, drowning and unable to breathe. The pain was blinding, suffocating, all-encompassing, and yet my thoughts were clear enough to know what he was doing. I knew I was nearing the brink of what I could take, that my mind was breaking, because the pain shifted to pleasure sometimes, and everything he did to me started to seem right.

It was a victimization process. Hurt me, break me, and make me a puppet for him to use. A slave for him. He kept talking, bringing up everything I'd ever done wrong, every mistake, and it blurred and blended with the torment of everything else.

_This is my fault_, I thought, _if I'd just done better..._

Eventually it was all a single moment and a lifetime, everything the same. The pain, the whips and the cuts and the burns... Agony became my world, and that was right and proper because I'd done something wrong and this was punishment. Some part of me thought that was a lie, that I'd broken under the hours of torture, but the larger part of my mind knew that this was the proper course of things.

Then things were burning me, and it was the same and yet different again. There was more, and I screamed every time something broke or bled. When he unchained me, I noticed, but only because the hot lances of agony were offset by the bitterly cold floor.}

I was crying again, dying anew with the memories, and it felt like I'd been weeping for a lifetime. I'd thought I'd healed and gotten over this, but it was all still there, buried in the darkness with my magic and my anger and my less desirable half.

_It's all a lie_, I thought, and it rang true to every part of me. _Everything I am... It's all a lie. I'm still that scared little girl with no control being beaten and raped by the person she loved. It's all still there. _

"The one thing I remember so wretchedly clearly is the rape."

The tears fell, and the anger rose, and the memories sucked me in again.

{The chains released me from the ceiling, but they only latched onto the floor. There was pain again, but what was more pain at this point? My world was pain. It meant nothing.

There was a rustling sound, and somehow I knew it was the rest of his clothing coming off.

And then he was behind me, forcing my head down and my hips up, and every single time he'd made love to me came back to my mind.

My magic flared out around me, dark and evil and protective, and it made the image of the room shift and mutilate itself. It did nothing to stop him, just warped my mind so that, maybe, just _maybe_, I wouldn't break. I screamed and I fought as all the good memories, every single feeling I'd had shattered and reshaped into the sharpest kind of hatred. I could see almost nothing through tears and a blinding sense of loathing for this... thing that was on me and around me and _in_ me. Every one of his movements, the slightest shift to the hardest thrust was agony, and each separate nerve that sensation ran along rebelled against it. My mind tried to shut down, tried to save what little was left of my sanity, but I felt and saw and knew everything that happened to me. I knew every bloody detail of what he did to me.

He licked at my blood, my sweat and my tears. He ran his hands over ever inch of my skin, pressed into every bruise and cut, and relished my screams. He pounded into me, and I could feel my body tearing, things ripping that there was no name for.

He flipped me and contorted me around, forced my body to respond, and the entire time my mind rebelled. He whispered to me, things he had said all the times we'd been together before.

"You're so beautiful," he crooned, just before he wrenched my head back by my hair and bit into my breast hard enough to break skin and muscle and draw a gush of blood.

"You're so bloody good," he moaned while he forced himself down my throat and held me there until I passed out.

It didn't matter. He revived me and continued.

"I love you Lily," he said, kicking me in the ribs. I heard something crack and I screamed hard enough to curdle my own blood. " I love you –" he punched my face as he said the words again and again, blood spewing everywhere as he broke my nose, cut my skin, bruised me and made me beg for him to stop. "I love you – so – fucking – much!" With every word, he beat me closer to unconsciousness – and to death.

He carved his name into my skin then. I remember that. He carved "Scorpius" into my back, down my spine. He told me he loved me again and again while he did it, that everyone would know what he'd done to me, know that I was his now, his bitch, his whore, his slut, his slave... all his.

All I could feel was a sense of violation and a burning, choking anger and an all-consuming fear.

All I could taste was tainted blood and throbbing hate and the rancid taste of him.

All I could see was the blood vessels twisted wretchedly into the mark on his arm and the dull glaze of his once bright quicksilver eyes and the blood dripping and running down my skin.}

"It took hours, and every second seemed like a year. The degradation, the humiliation, the fear and the pain and the sheer betrayal of it all blended and roiled in the pit of my stomach. But the final act, that's what finally broke me. And I _was_ broken, at the end of it. If he'd just stopped there, I could have stayed intact.

"He pulled me up by my hair, and he held me there. He forced my hands onto his prick, and he forced me to wank him off. He came all over my body. He wrenched my mouth open, and he shoved it down my throat until gagged, and then he pissed straight into me.

* * *

><p><strong>Warning<strong>

"And then he just dropped me, and moaned for the last time, and fell straight on top of me. He was huge, even though I'd grown from the tiny thing I'd been before. He pressed into every wound, every broken bone, every cut. I screamed again, but it meant nothing.

"He fell asleep on top of me, and I lay there, unmoving and unseeing and altogether broken, for hours, until the sun rose. He could have done anything to me, and I wouldn't have fought. I was helpless and hurting, dirty and sick and disgusting, and it was my fault. I'd brought it on myself.

"When he woke up... I ran as soon as I could. He trapped me with those wretched snakes, those bloody black pythons he loves so much. He made me listen, blamed it on Lord Sin and the Imperius curse, told me that it wasn't his fault and he would never hurt me.

"I was blind with terror by then. The sound of his voice, the look in his eyes, the way he moved - all of it tormented me.

"He let me go, and my magic pulsed through me. I ran with a speed I'd never known, despite the broken bones, the bleeding and trauma and exhaustion. I ran to my room, to my bed. to the only place I had warded and protected against attack. I went in, and I locked my curtains shut and rose what wards I could. And then I was unconscious for two whole days.

"I dreamed during those days, and they were dreams of the attack all over again. All of it, the cuts, the bruises, the burns, the marks, the bites, the broken bones, even the rape... Somehow, I'd brought it on myself. I'd done something horrible to him, something unforgivable and I still don't even know what I did wrong. I hate him, so much, and I'm so afraid of him. I want to hide every time he looks at me. I'm ashamed of what I did with him, of what I let happen... and it's all my fault."

There was silence for an eternity after I finished. My tears fell, and sobs wracked my body, but I kept them in and didn't make a sound. I'd done my screaming and crying out or a lifetime with him in that room. I would never do it again.

The bed shifted, and something in the tension of the room changed. It felt menacing and dangerous, and it brought back rushes of the feelings I'd just given life and free reign to again. I could feel an overpowering, deadly intent in the room, and it made me cower again. I heard the rustle of cloth, and it threw me back to the sound of clothes dropping to the floor just before -

"I'll kill him," said Rose. "I'll kill him right now." She was out the door and gone before either of us could stop her.

She was serious, and we all knew it. Raven raced out after her, and it struck me that they were like yin and yang, perfectly balanced, one hot-tempered and the other cool headed. And in my emotionally tattered state, my mind reeling, left alone and comfortless, this struck me as funny.

I laughed. I laughed like a madwoman, and tears rolled down my cheeks. The sound of it was harsh, but everything about it was perfect and fitting and proper, because I was like a broken doll, like _his_ broken doll, and this confusion and torment fit with that. As the pain of tears and the bliss of laughter, the mirth and the sorrow mixed together, all I could think was that I _was_ a coward, because I'd been hiding, and never healing. I'd stuffed this entire ordeal, all the feelings and insecurity and anger down into the dark place, with my magic and my dark side and my doubts and fears and problems.

I laughed as I sobbed, and I wept as I laughed. I went mad as I rationalized, and all of the conflicts and riddles of what was happening to me meshed together until there was no air left to breathe. I choked on the feelings, even though I knew it was impossible. I laughed and I cried myself into hyperventilation, and when I'd finally used up all the air, I passed out and finally slept in the comfortless, wretched softness of my cold, lonely bed.

The entire night, all I could dream of was the perverse desire to sleep in Scorpius's arms again, because surely, anything would be better than the demons I'd pulled out of myself.

Anything was better than this thrice damned, endless pain.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: Chapter 5: The Green Light's Flare


	5. The Green Light's Flare

**Chapter Five: The Green Light's Flare**

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

Light fell across the beds in soft streams, kissing the bronzes and blues of the Ravenclaw dorm room, making it glow with a warm, welcoming light. Outside, rain fell lightly, and the wind blew with a bite, but safe within the stone walls of the castle, it didn't reach the room, leaving it in peace. There was the low hum of water hitting stone, but it was dull and somehow added to the peace. There was silence, but it was warm and peaceful. A fire crackled in the hearth, and the room stayed warm. Blankets were pulled high, and they rustled as the girls below them shifted in sleep.

I looked on from the doorway, watching Raven and Rose sleep, and I felt none of the warmth of the air brushing my skin, none of the cold of the stones supporting my feet. I was neither happy nor sad, upset nor calm. I felt...

_Nothing_, I thought, _I feel nothing. And why should I? There's only pain._

And it was true. Pain was all there was left to hide from.

I was numb to everything else. There was no sensation, no emotion, no will. I felt like I was floating. Or maybe I wasn't even attached to my body. Everything seemed off.

But the world was right. I was what didn't fit.

I refused to think about the reasons why. The memories held more pain than I could bear, and they were so intertwined with everything I hated about myself, everything from the dark place, and all the things I'd tried to hide. I couldn't look at them. I couldn't bare to.

And so I felt nothing. Thought nothing. Was nothing.

There were motions I had to go through, and I did. I woke up, I went to breakfast, I went to classes. I performed well and thrived.

But I didn't function. I just was.

And so it went for weeks. I got up, did what was necessary, interacted, feigned happiness, and the others seemed to believe it.

It gave me enough time to master my pain.

**Raven**

I knew that all things happened for a reason. And I knew that even though I Saw things, they weren't mine to change.

But when I Saw things, I knew there was nothing I could do. They were distant from me, things I couldn't influence or change.

Watching Lily try to hide her pain was a form of slow torture for me. I'd Seen this from the beginning, Seen how things shifted and changed, and how Lily and Scorpius affected the world and each other and everything that came into contact with them. I knew that this would happen, that she would get hurt.

I'd never imagined that it would be like what she described though. I'd never Seen it, and she'd never let anyone know what had happened that night.

_She hid again,_ I thought. _She always hides her pain. What's made her like this?_ _What could have possibly happened?_

I didn't know. I didn't think that I ever really would.

She acted normally. She talked, but she never really engaged. She smiled, and it never reached her eyes. She went to class, studied, did everything that was normal.

But something was wrong. She was empty. Her eyes were dead now, no longer flashing and bright as they'd been before she' told us.

"Today you will be brewing a very difficult Potion, one that is disastrous if..."

We were in Potions. It was Lily's favorite subject, though she hated the Professor. Potions were her joy, and she was always vibrant and laughing in the class. She'd never take her eyes off her work, but she'd talk and joke with anyone around her.

But not now. Not anymore. It was double Potions today, two full class periods, and Lily had yet to speak a word. She simply followed the instructions in the book and on the board, like a broken doll tugged around by her strings.

I hated it. I wanted to shake her, scream at her, something, anything to force her to wake up and stop being this... Shell.

But none of that would help her. She was too far gone, and I knew it. I knew what happened next in this twisted, sickening, torturous plot.

She wasn't broken. No, Lily was just afraid to face anything that she'd brought back up from "the dark place." She'd be broken, before this was over. We all would be.

But things have to be broken before they can be fixed.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

This was the acutest form of agony.

I dreamed about her every night. Of how it had been before I'd been cursed, of the way her hair felt against my skin, the lingering smell of her on everything I owned. Her laugh and her smile and her constant presence.

I was aware of everything about her, still. Every move, every breath, everything.

I still loved her. And now she walked around, different, broken, and hiding because of me.

I don't know what had happened to her, but she wouldn't meet my eyes anymore. She went out of her way to avoid me. She sat facing me, with her back to a wall, so that she could see me and escape.

Something was wrong, and I knew I could fix it, but there was nothing I could _do._

At breakfast, the morning after her friends had all but carried her out of the hall, I watched her. Every day, in the halls, in classes, at lunch and dinner, I watched her. Everyone I knew noticed, and they tried to get me to stop. Obsession, they said. Stalking.

But I knew what it was. I was protecting Lily the only way I knew how.

And then my arm started to burn and throb, slowly at first.

It was three days before the attack that changed everything by razing it to the ground.

**Lily**

I was at dinner, after another class filled with false smiles and lack of focus. I felt, for the first time in weeks, and it was the draining weight of fatigue.

_I can't keep going like this for much longer_. I knew it was true. It was only two months into term, and I was already reaching my limit. There was no way I'd make it to Christmas.

_Better to go quietly I suppose_. _Perhaps I can steal some of the satisfaction away from Malfoy. He'd expect some dramatic, public breakdown. I could just slip quietly away and spite the bastard._

It would be a fantastic way to go.

It was Halloween, and it was supposed to be the best night of the year. Magic was stirring from the nearness to Beltane, and the ghosts were flitting about. The feast was fabulous, better than even the one last year, and the entire hall was smiles and joy and fun. All the first years were bouncing about closest to the head tables, and the second years sat a little farther down. At the end farthest from the dais where the Professors sat, there were the sixth and seventh years. Us.

No house colors were on display tonight, just the festive decoration of Halloween under a ceiling reflecting the starless sky.

I felt trapped, for some inexplicable reason. It was a familiar sensation though. Malfoy was at my back, staring at me with those thrice-damned eyes.

I hated when I couldn't get a seat with my back to the wall. The feel of his eyes on my unprotected back made it harder to restrain the memories in the dark place.

My discomfort didn't last long.

I'd had a bad feeling all night, but just before Headmistress McGonogall stood to deliver the opening speech, it intensified. My magic, trapped inside the dark place with the rest of the bad parts of me, tried to throw off my hold on it, thrashing and writhing and struggling.

Next to me, Raven's eyes glossed over, and her pupil's disappeared.

This was the culmination of one of her visions. I had just a moment to wonder at what was happening before the world was on fire.

There were screams, horrible frightened screams of children in the seconds after the first blast. But before that, just as the wall behind the High Table burst inward, there was the sound of rock striking flesh, of breaking bone, of bodies flying and burning. There was the smell of fire and blood, of charred flesh and hair. There was another sense – the _other_ sense from the dark place that felt life fading almost too fast to follow. And above it all was a piercing, joyous, evil laughter.

The heat washed over the rest of the hall. The shockwave knocked the first years near the front of the tables backwards, and everything flew toward the back of the enormous hall. The candles above us flared impossibly bright, and then snuffed out. Darkness poured into the hall under the reflection of the starless sky above us.

Then the fog came. Inky black and roiling, it rolled in through the ruined wall. Shapes formed from it, black-cloaked and skull-masked. They were exactly like the death-eaters of the Second War except –

_They're dripping blood from their foreheads onto the masks._

My head hit something solid behind me, and for a moment the world was dark and silent. I would never be able to tell afterwards if it was really that way or if something had gone wrong with my brain.

The split second of senselessness ended as green light erupted from an army of wands. The same spell fired as the cloaked figures seemed to chant the incantation on a screaming roar.

"_AVADA KEDAVRA!"_

The first to die didn't even have time to scream or cry. Maybe theirs was the most merciful death.

It was chaos from there. The cloaked army in the front of the hall kept firing, now with spells meant for pain and torment rather than a swift death. The cloud of fog seemed to solidify in the middle as children screamed and died. I ran forward, unthinking, wand out and firing every spell I knew. I could see others to my sides doing the same. I knew there were more behind us.

Most of them fell. Those who didn't pressed on.

We made a line between the smallest children and the killers. It was useless – we didn't save many. Some had the chance to run. Some got away. I could hear the screams of classmates ring around me, the crash of misaimed spells against walls. Smoke rose from the fires around us, and it seemed we were trapped in the fires of hell. I kept hexing and cursing and shielding who I could. The figures started to thin.

Not for long. The fog that had gathered in the center of the attackers finally snapped to solid form. The evil laughter rose above the din of the battle and the shrieks of the tortured and dying.

It was a man. He led this strike. He was covered by blood red, almost black armor. His skin was dark as night, his eyes shone devil's red. His mouth was split wide as he laughed in sick joy. A crown of needle-sharp bones sat atop his head, and blood dripped down from where it met his skin. He sat atop a horse that was black as midnight. From its head spiraled a single glistening horn. It dripped blood as well.

_A unicorn. They're always white. There's never been a black one recorded in history and they've been documented for centurie—_

Someone slammed into me, knocking me to the floor. Fear overrode my senses, but before it could freeze me a burning rage took its place. Children had _died_ because of these monsters. They were _touching_ me. I would never be clean again.

I aimed my wand between the eyes of my assailant, unseeing, operating on instinct. Before I could fire a single spell though, a pair of quicksilver eyes caught mine.

Scorpius Malfoy.

A flash of green light soared over his back and slammed into the table behind us. It splintered and caught fire, spraying the area with fiery arrows.

A Killing Curse. He'd saved my life.

"We have to drive them back," he said, and his eyes flashed molten for a moment as his hands dragged over my body, checking me for wounds. "The Professors, the Headmistress – Only a few are still alive. They're fighting but it's up to us. Gather the older students, get the children out of here. Find the ones willing to fight with us. I'll do the same. Bring them to the Room of Requirement. We'll finish before more people die."

I could only nod in understanding and confusion as his fiery eyes held my gaze. This was the Scorpius I'd loved, the unstoppable force that protected with everything he had. Was he alive after all? But how could he be, after what Malfoy had done to me? Was he my Scorpius, or was he a monster like Malfoy?

He fired another spell toward the attackers, and then he was up and gone to do as he'd said.

Another spell shot past my head, bright green and terrible, and the confusion fled. Regardless of who he was, he had presented the most logical plan. I didn't hesitate to follow that plan in the midst of battle. I was up, running, and firing as I did as he bade.

The screams continued, but now some of them were from the black cloaked figures. The monster atop that abominable unicorn was still laughing his ghastly laugh, sending the Cruciatus Curse indifferently into the crowd.

Every child I saw, I told to run. Some resisted. All went eventually. I gathered everyone I could. 5 or so Professors were hurling spells into the black mass attacking us. I could see more and more cloaked figures falling to the floor as the monsters laughter grew louder.

_He's controlling them_, I realized as I sent group after group of children out of the hall. I told them to run fast and hard to Hogsmeade – to get the owner of Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes and get him to bring help. They listened and ran.

_It's the Imperius Curse_, I thought as I gathered what sixth and seventh years I could.

I froze as the next epiphany hit me.

_This is the Black Knight._

Scorpius had never lied to me.

I took the groups I'd gathered and ran to the Room of Requirement.

* * *

><p><strong>Raven<strong>

Seeing never made these things easier. It never helped when you saw death and destruction of something pure and good.

I was so happy that I had never seen this coming – my Sight had at least saved me from this terror. I would have lost my sanity had I known.

The prophecy I had Seen at the beginning of the year was already coming to pass. I had never expected it so soon, and never like this. And yet bodies fell all around me, and all I could do was throw weak, meaningless spells at a seemingly endless army of wraiths.

I ducked a Cruciatus curse and from my position on the floor I could see Lily firing spells left and right – spells I'd never seen fly from a wand before. She was using her arsenal of invented spells, and it was beautiful and vicious to watch.

Silver flashed over me, and I had time to see Scorpius sprinting toward her before a hex made the ground near me explode. I shielded myself, and before the air could clear, another vision seized me.

My visions were never peaceful, and they were never easy on my body. My arms and legs locked up, and with visions of something sure to happen, I fell into helpless seizures. This one, here and now, would most likely get me captured - or killed.

The vision seized me and time faded.

The world was a misty, swirling black. The dark air drifted and curled, carrying with it the dense, cloying smell of smoke and fire – but also of blood and death. There was no light, no sound, just the spinning stinking blackness.

I could feel the cold mist against my unreal skin, shifting as I moved forward. There was no distance to judge, no floor beneath my feet, no light to see or time to waste. I walked ceaselessly, for a second and an eternity, with nothing to remind me where I was going or from whence I came. It was bliss and madness.

My eyes went blind and closed. My mind circled on some empty high, and my feet shuffled onward meaninglessly.

A bright green spell whizzed past my ear, ruffling my hair. I heard it hiss and spit, almost snakelike as it passed. Another shot under my arm, and I heard it burrow into something behind me. The mist was whipping now, angry and violent. It tossed me to the ground as another green shot flew through the space I had just been in.

Some of the mist dissipated, and I heard screams of pain and death through the ringing silence. My eyes were blinded by the sudden light after so long in the darkness. The mist split, and a horrible shining light poured in. A screaming pain raced through my body as the light touched me. I reared back, trying desperately to escape the blinding, burning light. More spells of bright green hissed, spit, and whistled by me, near enough to almost graze my skin.

Someone cried something, and I felt its pull deep in my chest. I crawled faster into the darkness, but the pull would not let my eyes remain closed.

It was difficult to see anything through the murky darkness roiling around me. There was no light in the room beyond the cloud of black, no windows, no doors – but somehow, as the light swept in through the darkness, vision came more easily.

There was someone before me, cloaked in a dark, yet shining material. Her cloak was billowing black smoke, and her long inky hair fanned out around her, covering her face completely so I could not see who she was. Next to her was a shining figure, all bright light whiteness. Both were firing the green spells that plagued me.

The darker figure called something again, and the same pull wrenched in my chest. The darkness clouding around me, my darkness – my master would not release me, but this new figure was powerful, and her cries summoned me mercilessly. The darkness shrank back more and more, their horrible green shots pushing it farther away from me. The light was torturous and blinding, but every second things became clearer.

Her cloak was not smoke, but silk, and it billowed around her in the tempest of power raging around us all. The darkness was not real – it was my safety, my master. Lord Sin. The shining white figure was not just light, but a person, a man, opposite and in tune with the woman in every way.

It was Scorpius. Scorpius and Lily.

The darkness around me shrieked and shrank back further as more green shots – killing curses – were fired into it. Lily screamed something again, but I couldn't hear what it was over t the cacophonous din of magic clashing and spells firing. I could barely see for the magic whipping through the air. But even through it, where we were became clear.

I had heard tales of the Veil from my mother and Uncle Harry, but never did I think I would see it. The door to the realm of death is never something you think you will see.

Yet here we stood. Here we battled.

The darkness – no, the Black Knight still had a firm hold on me. My legs were caught, unmoving, in the inky blackness roiling around him. Curses still flew, from both sides I saw now, but I could clearly see that Lily and Scorpius had the upper hand. They had the offensive position. Lord Sin was forced into protecting himself.

He fired many dark, horrible curses, but none of them slowed the two. Not even when the spells hit their marks did they affect my two friends. They had a protection far greater than any dark curse.

But they did not have protection from the laws of Fate.

Magic swirled in a fiery torrent, barely contained by the inescapable walls of the veil room. It singed everything it touched, and the walls, ceiling and floor were already streaked with blackened, crumbling stone. The heat of the room flared, and again the light blinded me, though I could still see Lily shouting and Scorpius firing curses into the black monster that was trapping me. They were both close enough to touch the Veil, but neither were giving ground. The pull in my chest grew stronger as Lily motioned with her arm one final time, screaming her spell.

"_Accio Raven Longbot –_"

She never got the chance to finish those final words.

Lord Sin was a sick twisted bastard. He knew that he would die here, knew that he was already on the brink of death. He drew his entire being back into himself, grasping at all the magic left to him, and cast one final spell at Lily.

"_BOMBARDA!_" he hissed.

Neither Scorpius nor Lily moved fast enough to avoid the spell's impact. The stood close to each other, united and strong. Yet now, that very unity would bring their demise.

The spell hit the ground just under Scorpius' feet, and the explosion opened a hole in the stone big enough to cradle three corpses like babies in a mother's arms. Stone flew up and rained down again, and the sound drowned out even the whirling, whipping magic of the room.

Scorpius flew backwards, twisting as he did, trying to cover and protect Lily from the rocky shrapnel flying at them. His protection did no good. As he turned and tried to keep her in his arms, the shockwave of the explosion hit, and he was sent flying into her, pushing her back further than the force of the explosion, further and further from the evil of the Black Knight, yet closer, ever closer to…

Lily fell through the Veil.

My mind raced back to the present moment from the future of my vision. My body was in shock, seizing under the table helplessly, and my head was slamming into the floor under me. The screams of children still rang around me, but I was trapped in this useless, uncontrollable shell.

My body arched impossibly, and red hot pain raced through my body to explode behind my eyes. My head hit the stone floor of the demolished Great Hall one last time, and blood ran down my neck to drip and pool on the floor.

I had a moment to think: _This is where I will die. What a useless way to end._

Then there was only blackness.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

There were about a hundred students following me - all that was left of the seven years of Hogwarts. Most of them were older, with more knowledge of magic, and better abilities to defend themselves. But some of our brightest had fallen under the wands of the enemy along with the rest.

All of us were in shock from watching helpless children fall and die. All of us were ready to fight, prepared to kill. There wasn't one who hadn't lost someone to the Killing Curse today.

I don't remember a single instant of the sneaking, furtive retreat to the Room of Requirement. I don't remember the close calls, the hushed whispers, the fear, the cloying driving sadness. I remember burning, roiling rage at the deaths of so many. I remember a chilling rush of adrenaline. My mind was crystal sharp. My eyes saw every detail of the safe haven the castle had once been for me. My steps were silent, and I swore I could hear the sound of blood dripping off the walls of the school. The smell of death and blood, smoke and fire, was everywhere. It matched the deadly, explosive rage within me.

But I wasn't thinking of anything that had happened. There was only one thought, with one meaning circling endlessly through my head. And every time it passed, more convictions piled up behind it.

_That was Lord Sin._

I knew it was true. Scorpius had described him to me endlessly – the death and pain, the smell of rot and blood, the darkness, the dread, and the cold, freezing knowledge that evil was before you. He had told me time and again that the Black Knight was more than his excuse, more than a lie to rid him of the guilt he felt.

I believed him now. I knew what he had said was truth.

It made me to question everything, but I knew the answers already. I knew I still loved him. I had felt the pain of it every time I saw him or thought of him. It cut me every second of every day.

I knew now that he hadn't been the one to cause me pain. It had been his body, and I knew I would still be afraid to have him touch me. I knew that his appearance would still bring the memories and the impending feeling of doom with it. But it wasn't Scorpius that had done it. It was the monster that I had just faced.

I realized that there was nothing standing between us anymore.

_But somehow, I wish there was, because knowledge didn't absolve the roiling emotions hidden in the dark place. _

But there was no time for difficult explanations now. I had to tell him, to let him know. If we died in this fight for vengeance, he had to die knowing that I believed him. That I loved him.

He needed a sign.

As we approached the tapestry hiding the room, I caught sight of his silver hair above the crowd. There were maybe another fifty students with him, most breaking down to some extent. He didn't see me.

My resolve strengthened even as my emotions raged against what I was about to do. The body, the eyes, the carriage he had were like claws sunk deep into everything that hurt in me, dragging it up despite bindings and ties and contradictions.

I forced my mind away from it.

I knew revenge almost as well as I knew myself. I had heard stories of battles from the Second War. I knew all the plans, all the strategies, and I had my own arsenal of spells. My entire family was made up of heroes from the fight against Voldemort. I knew that I could do this. With the upgraded defense classes at Hogwarts, I knew that we had a good chance of surviving this battle. In a cohesive group with a direction, we could drive the Black Knight back.

But I knew some of us would die. I knew we would lose more than just people today. We'd lose parts of our souls.

It was premature, and it seemed worthless. These were children. I was only 15. Were we supposed to be able to fight? Why weren't there people to save us this time?

_They're dead Lily. This is all that's left, and no one else knows._

So we had to fight. I knew from my father that evil didn't die after a single attack. When someone killed, they would do it again, and again. This wouldn't be a victory. We'd lose many only to stave the evil off for a bit.

Scorpius had told me of the war to come. He had told me that Lord Sin made Voldemort look like a philanthropist, like an upstanding, moral citizen.

This would be war. This wouldn't end here. I just hoped we survived this battle to fight again.

As we got closer, people rushed to join us. They raced to their friends, cried together and hugged. I didn't stop. I didn't care. My eyes were locked on the flash of telltale silver that had comforted me and broken me over all these years.

I ran to him. I didn't care who he was at that point. I didn't care if my reasoning was faulty, or if there were so many latent problems between us that it was almost comical. He was alive, he was safe. He wasn't Malfoy, and he hadn't lied. He was my Scorpius, and some small part of my mind had been so sure that I'd lost him. I hadn't realized how terrified I was of that, under all the other fears, until I saw him.

It wasn't dignified. It wasn't anything I'd normally do. But he heard me, or sensed me, or just _knew_, and he turned to see me.

I tackled him. I hugged him, buried my face in his neck and cried, tears of pain and fear and joy at the same time.

He didn't question it. He was always controlled, and I was always reserved. It came with our pasts and our families and the expectations of us. There was none of that now. There couldn't be, wouldn't be. He held on to me, tight enough that I could barely breathe, but it wasn't tight enough. I couldn't see him clearly through my tears, but I didn't care. I knew him as well as I knew myself.

When I kissed him, it was coming home. He was shocked, and for a second he didn't move. But it passed and he was there with me. It wasn't passion, and it wasn't lust. I needed him to be my strength, to hold a part of me safe so that maybe I wouldn't lose myself in the fight to come. He needed the same from me.

It was chaste – well, not chaste. Kissing him could never be considered that. But it was innocent. Pure.

One kiss and everything settled. The fear and the pain were still there. We would still have to talk and work everything out and get rid of the doubts we had in each other and ourselves. The dark place still churned with a murderous mix of magic, fear, and anger. But he knew I loved him. He knew I trusted him. I knew the same. For now, that was enough.

He mumbled something against my neck, and I felt the wet warmth of tears fall on my bare skin. He was crying as I was, mumbling something I couldn't hear.

He let out an almost keening wail, a sound I had never heard from him before. It sounded painful, like a man grieving for the loss of one he loved.

Something was wrong.

"What is it?" When he didn't respond, I lifted his brimming silver eyes to mine. "What's wrong Scorpius?"

He closed his eyes slowly, pressing his cheek into the palm of my hand. More tears spilled from his eyes, and he took a shuddering breath. His jawline hardened, and I felt his spine stiffen. He straightened. The strength of his grip lifted me off of the ground as he rose to his full height, a full 18 centimeters taller than me.

He didn't keep me there for long. Slowly, surely, he let me slide down toward the floor, until my head rested on his chest, and I could hear his heart beating. I felt another tear drop into my hair when it fell from his face above me. He wouldn't let me look up at him. He stood there, stiff and strong, and he held me against him for what seemed like forever.

Not a second later, he said, "Medusos was killed in the battle."

I stayed silent as the news hit me. Medusos had been everything to Scorpius, the one thing he was determined to protect and shield from getting hurt by anything and everything. That bright and shining little child, so filled with joy, with so much ahead of him – gone forever.

"Madeline Weasley was killed as well. Professor Longbottom is dead. So is Headmistress McGonogall. Raven is missing. I saw Albus here, and James is around too. I haven't seen the Krum boys. I don't know about the rest of the Weasleys. Mikael's little brother is dead, and Violet died fighting with her little sisters. The entire Sorted year is gone, and the Great Hall is a bloody body ground and there was nothing I could do to stop him and he hurt you agai—"

I clung to him tighter, rocking him a bit, trying my best to comfort him when I didn't know what comfort was. I hushed him and whispered meaningless little assurances to him. He clutched me so tight that I thought our bodies would meld together.

"They killed my brother. They killed Medusos. He killed him. We have to fight Him Lily. We have to get rid of Him, make Him pay." I felt his muscles clench, and he pushed me firmly away.

This was a side of Scorpius I had never seen. It resembled, too closely, the monster that he had been when he beat me. He was hardened, determined, and his body language screamed challenge, rage, the need to fight and dominate and conquer. I was afraid of him, so much so that I couldn't stuff it into the dark place, because the fear overflowed it and clouded my mind. The memories...

When he looked at me, his eyes were glacial, but thunderous. It looked like a storm was raging within him, and for just a moment, I thought I felt his magic brush my senses.

I was terrified and in shock. Grieving. I was angry. I was utterly enraged and disgusted by what had happened, though I didn't even know, at this point, what had. I was ready to drive these monsters out of my home. But I wanted to save the lives that I could and recover the bodies of those I couldn't.

Scorpius wanted vengeance. He wanted blood. He wanted to kill.

And with the death I had seen today, I could not deny him the right.

He turned from me, not fully, but enough to show me that he was through talking. I studied him, his profile, the way his shoulders were tensed and his wand was clasped tight in his hand.

He cast a spell, a Sonorous Charm. His voice rang out over the hallway before the Room of Requirement.

"I am not one for talking. I do not speak unless I find it important. I do not lead."

All eyes turned to him.

"I have faced this monster before. He is real, and He is evil. He is what you have heard about in rumor and secret. This thing is Lord Sin, the Black Knight."

There were gasps of shock and horror. They were momentary. The expressions of every student there hardened and darkened. I thought I felt the brush of Scorpius's magic again.

"I don't know many of you. You don't know me. I don't know what you've lost, and I don't know your pasts or your futures or what you have to lose. I know that you are afraid, but I also know that there is a rage burning within you that calls for vengeance and calls for blood. For those we have lost, we must stand and fight. Think of the people that are gone forever. Feel the pain and the fear of this. Let it eat at you, and vow to yourself that you will never feel this way again."

I heard murmurs of approval and support rising from the crowd. A few of the older students moved forward. No one's attention drifted from Scorpius. I felt that ethereal brush of magic from him again.

"Stand with me now, and fight. Let go of the fear. Let go of the grief and the sadness. There will be proper time to mourn when the evil has been driven off. But now stand with me. Stand for the ones you have lost. Stand for revenge. Stand for blood. Stand to protect what we have left. Stand with me against this. Stand and FIGHT!"

A roar rose up from the crowd. Wand raised in the air, sparks shooting from each of them, until the hall was diffused in a burning red glow.

No one stayed behind. Black mist roiled out from around the corner of the hall, and a chill swept the air. The scent of blood and death, fire and pain engulfed the hall. As one, the remainder of Hogwarts turned and faced the oncoming forces of the Black Knight. They turned, all together, and we all stood, ready to fight.

There was no question. We would fight to save this place. To save ourselves.

But more than that, we would fight for the ones we had lost.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: Chapter 6: The Dark Place


	6. The Dark Place

**Chapter Six: The Dark Place**

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

_We need an undetectable way through the school._

It was taking too long to pace before the door of the Room of Requirement. We were trapped here, and the others weren't in any shape to be doing anything. My blood would be like a beacon to Lord Sin, now that he knew I was here. The fact that I was fighting the Call would enrage him.

No one was safe with me. And yet, I was the only one with an inkling how to fight the monster in our school.

_We need an undetectable way through the school._

Lily was nearby, holding one crying Weasley or another. Her brothers, the dolts, were nearby. Albus looked ready to blow a blood vessel, but also on the verge of tears. James looked like a statue. He'd seen Lily nearly get hit by the Killing Curse. He'd seen me save her too.

_We need an undetectable way through the school._

The wall shifted before me, forming into a door about two people wide. It was still taking to long. Every second could be someone else's death.

"Rushing won't help, Scorpius," came the whisper from a few feet behind me. I jumped and whirled to face it, wand at the ready and a curse on my lips.

It was Lily, eyes wide, trembling, and flinching away from me. She'd not touched me again, since I'd called the others to fight.

I realized why now - she was afraid of me. Again.

_Damn Him for what he's done to us._

"Rushing will only make mistakes," she said, and it struck me, as it had so many times since I'd been cursed, that the Lily I'd known was gone. "Be quick, but don't rush." She looked from my eyes to the wand in my hand, and her eyes hardened, her shaking stopped.

"And point _that_ away from me. Don't ever point it at me again." Her eyes sparked, and I felt my wand tremble and heat as a bit of her magic slipped from her rigid control. It was dark, consuming. Frightening. She looked ready to kill.

_And maybe she is. You're under your own control, and you're threatening her again. How much more are you going to hurt her?_

My wand lowered, too slowly, and yet not slowly enough. This wasn't the Lily I knew. She wasn't gentle or expressive with me. She was wary, like something wild. I didn't feel safe.

_You have no right to feel safe. You gave that up when you couldn't fight off that _thing_ and keep it from hurting her._

Her eyes calmed a bit, but her magic still flared. her robes shifted slightly, blown in a breeze that wasn't there. Her control was nearly gone, if her magic was presenting physically.

"He'll be able to sense you, won't he?" she asked, after a tense moment.

I felt a pang of guilt in my chest. Lord Sin had Called me.

Lily knew about the way Lord Sin did things. He'd managed to access the power of the Dark Mark left behind by Voldemort. He twined blood magic with the link left in the Dark Mark, so that anyone related by blood to one of the Marked would be under his control too. He sent out an impossibly strong Imperius through the bloodline, and then the entire line was under his control. We were lucky that it only reached to the living, and not the dead.

He'd used the curse on me to attack and destroy Lily. He knew what my blood felt like. He knew I was here, and my blood was still burning. The whispers in my head would start soon, and then He'd be close enough to use me to kill anyone near me.

"He'll be able to use me like before, Lily."

She didn't flinch, but her eyes changed, and it looked like they were bleeding pain. She blinked once, breathed a little deeper, and then it was gone. She was calm and ready again, suppressing the hell out of everything. She nodded, and that was that.

"Then I'm sorry," she murmured.

"What is there for you to possibly be sorry for, love?"

I got no answer. She raised her arm, and her magic flared, suffocating and fierce.

"_Stupefy._"

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

My control was nearly gone. With my magic, the memories I'd hidden, the emotions I'd suppressed for years, and the shock and trauma of the fight and the deaths of so many tonight, the dark place was overflowing into my mind. I was angry, and it wasn't the passing emotion I'd forced it to be. It was a deep, fast flowing rage, and it never seemed to stop.

I was calm. I had to be. The dark place needed to be emptied of something, and then the rest would fit. That was all. Then I could be sane again. Then all these too-strong feelings would stop.

My magic took up a massive amount of the dark place. It was tainted magic, and it stemmed from my father's connection to Voldemort. There'd been a mark left on my genetics because of it, linked to the x-chromosome. My brothers' magic was weaker, and it was clean. Mine was nearly impossible to control.

The memories took up less space. Memories of the attack, of every trauma, the teasing, the effects of my magic, the way my mother had disowned me, never touched me, and cast me out of my family...

_Don't think about it Lily._

The memories were debilitating.

There were the emotions I'd hidden. Anger, fear, selfish desires, the urge to hurt and control and manipulate, to get my way... Those were all in the dark place, but their space was insignificant, next to the magic and the memories. The emotions clouded my mind and made it hard to think.

So the magic had to come out. It was the largest, and it was the lesser of all the evils. It frightened people, and it was dark and evil and consuming, and it was difficult to control. I hated it. But power was necessary to keeping these people safe, and the magic was a power I could use. It would make me an asset, rather than a liability.

"He'll be able to sense you, won't he?" I asked Scorpius, because I was calm again, and I could talk without speaking in Parseltongue. I hated the turmoil this was creating. I let my magic slip out a bit, trying to gain back some peace.

Scorpius flinched like he'd been hit, but his eyes hardened and he squared his shoulders to face me. "He'll be able to use me like before, Lily."

I felt my heart stop, and the memories bucked against my control, clawing for freedom. The attack, the fear, the pain, the utter sense of betrayal rose again. I let more of my magic slip and forced them back down. Now was not the time.

"Then I'm sorry," I whispered, and it held the shame I felt. I didn't want to have to make the decision, but if Scorpius was controlled by Lord Sin, I'd attack him, and I wouldn't be anything but a liability to the others. I'd get people killed, and I'd kill Scorpius in the process.

"What is there for you to possibly be sorry for?"

I didn't answer him, but the memories of everything I'd ever done wrong and the emotions I'd felt that hurt others, the feeling of the magic that had gained me my mothers hatred on my skin brought me to the brink of my control. Pieces of it shredded and nearly let everything to the surface.

I let my magic go in a rush, and the sudden release of tension nearly made me fall to my knees with relief. It clouded around me, dark and tainted, and it was almost comforting. The magic almost had a will and personality of it's own, and it made me feel like I wasn't alone.

I raised my wand, but it took more strength than it ever had before. The magic wanted lash out on its own, not be funneled through a wand.

I forced it. It was my magic, and it would do as I said.

Scorpius had a moment to look confused before my spell hit him and he fell to the ground, unconscious and vulnerable.

"I'm sorry," I said again, and it was a bit stronger, and a bit more snake-like than it had been before.

I dragged him over to the door leading to the Room of Requirement. It opened before I touched it, my magic manipulating things without my approval. I didn't care though. There was very little time for us to stay vulnerable in the hallway.

There was no need for spells with my magic out. It listened to my will, not my wand, and I wanted to be heard. Everyone could feel my magic by now anyway. They were all looking. They all knew.

"Get into the room," I demanded. "It's not safe out here. Take the wounded, the young, and those unwilling to fight to the far side, and rest them against the wall."

There was the sound of rustling clothing, comforting words, and muttered spells as they moved. It was slow progress, and we didn't have the time to waste. I wished they'd hurry, but I knew they wouldn't. These people were wounded, in shock, grieving.

I watched them as they filed in slowly. There were some small ones from the lower years that had survived. There were faces missing that I knew should have ben there. _Dead,_ my mind said. It didn't bear thinking about. Not now.

Raven was missing. Rose was pissed. One of the younger Krums was searching frantically for his brother. He found them, further down the line, and I hugged each of them, before they went into the Room.

No one spoke. There was something in the air that kept it silent. We all knew, somehow, that any sound could attract attention and get us all killed. There were tears and sobs, but they were silent. Some looked at me in fear, with my magic out and flaring. Others looked at me in awe. I hated both reactions. I was a person, and I was trying to help them. Now was not the time for emotion. Now was the time for analyzing, planning. Control.

I followed the last person into the room, leaving Scorpius where he had been, laying near the door. The door slammed shut behind us and faded into the wall.

On the opposite side, a tunnel opened, torchlit and wide enough for three people to pass through side by side. The shock of the slamming door in the quiet, and the sudden, bright light was enough to shock people into reaching for their wands. Noise erupted in the room. Children cried and people screamed, and the wounded shrieked in fear.

But some of them shifted, wands out and watchful. They scanned the room, carefully. Silently. They were wary, but after the first attack on the Great Hall, they had a better idea of how to save themselves. They were still alive, after all.

"QUIET!" I screamed, and the magic carried my voice so that it echoed off the walls.

The silence rang in my ears suddenly. It felt like the room breathed for all of us, with the echoes of my scream.

"I know you're afraid and confused. I know you've all been through something traumatic. I know you feel threatened, and that you wish this was all a bad dream. But it's not. We can't change it, and we're only going to get discovered and slaughtered sooner if you keep making that terrible, thought-shredding, unproductive racket!"

Perhaps that hadn't been the best choice of words. Talk of slaughter was unlikely to quiet them.

"We need to stay quiet," I pressed on, "in order to stay safe. I don't know what the Room of Requirement is providing right now. I didn't summon it, and the one who did... Isn't available to ask." _Because I left him outside, to face that monster, in some misguided attempt to save these people's lives_.

There was no going back now though.

"We have to fight. You heard what he said before. Scorpius is right. We have to drive them out. No one knows about this yet, and we can't get word out. We'll have to do this ourselves. We might get help if someone in Hogsmeade saw the blast or the smoke. But we can't count on it. We have no food no water, and very little room. We cant hold out here for long. We have to drive them out."

I looked from person to person, and I saw the people I would take, the people who would cower in fear in this room, and the people I would have to oppose to get us all out of here alive. Surrender wasn't an option, and if they thought it was, they were deluded and wrong.

"I need the wounded, the young, and the afraid to stay here. I'm almost certain that the tunnel behind you is a way through the school that the people who attacked us don't know about. I need those willing to fight to come with me-"

Screams of protest erupted around me, and people started advancing on me, in my place by the door that had disappeared.

Something snapped in my mind, and I was angry, annoyed, and all together _done_ coddling these people. I'd sacrificed Scorpius and my privacy and my pride to save them. I didn't have time for this.

"_Silencio,_" I cast, and my magic flared and cast the quiet over the whole room.

"I have neither time, nor patience for this," I said, and my voice was hard and cold. "They are coming to find us. The stones of the castle are screaming, and I can feel the aura of evil pushing closer toward us every second. The man I left outside the door is like a beacon to these people. You are safe here, for now, but he is not, and neither is anyone still left in the castle. They _will_ find this place, and if we don't drive them off soon enough, they _will _breach it, and you'll be slaughtered. They will not take prisoners. They will not negotiate. They are here to kill. Now, all those willing to fight _will_. _Follow. Me._ The rest of you will care for the wounded, and cast what wards you know around this room. Make as little noise as possible. Do not leave."

I started toward the tunnel on the other side of the room.

I pushed my way through the crowd of people, probably a hundred or so, slowly. I watched their faces, and though most shied away, some steeled themselves and followed.

Mikael Zabini. Rose and Hugo Weasley. Albus and James Potter. Dimitri and Aleksander Krum. Jeanne Abbot. James Wood.

Ten of us. That was it. Ten of us against a force of hundreds.

We moved into the tunnels, heads held high, eyes hard, wands ready, and fully aware we were running toward death.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

It was strange, to be outside my own mind and in Lily's.

It was like the links we'd shared when we were together. We'd saved each other's lives too many times, cared about each other too much, and been too close to each other to not have something form between us. Our magics had combined, blended, and closed the gap between our minds. It wasn't very strong, and it wasn't all the time, but it had given her abilities of mine, and me abilities of hers. It was how I'd learned Parseltongue and how shed learned to sense magic. In times of trouble, we were linked together. We knew what was happening to each other. It was what made us so effective when times of trouble came.

I'd thought it would be gone, with everything that had happened. I'd been wrong.

My body was unconscious, left for dead outside the Room of Requirement. I felt betrayed by it, and Lily felt it was a betrayal. But she had more lives than mine to save, and I would only bring Lord Sin against them faster.

I couldn't hate her for it. I'd done so much worse.

She spoke and inspired the people who would listen. She didn't know it, but more followed her, minutes after her group had left.

The tunnels led her where she needed to go, and I could feel her determination, her need to protect.

And her shame. I felt her shame at having her magic out, using it even though it was tainted. She hated it.

But more than anything, I could feel the presence of some sort of black hole in the back of her mind. It was dark and roiling and near full. It spun like a whirlpool. It was a thick, slimy, bubbling mass, waiting for a chance to claw it's way out of the web of control Lily had spun around it. It was explosive, dark, and deadly.

This was the dark place.

The tunnel they were in was getting thinner, until only one person at a time could fit through, and then barely a person could get into the space. They pressed on despite the crush. It opened, suddenly, to another passage, one running parallel to the wall.

There was light, little dots of it, all through the tunnel. It looked like light shining through the a window or...

_Torchlight, through holes in the wall, _Lily thought, and suddenly her mind was whirling with activity.

The dark place stirred up again, spinning faster and nearly running over the sides of it's confinement. The way Lily's mind worked was too fast to comprehend, absolutely fascinating in its complexities. Ideas were processed and accepted or discarded, plans shaping and forming, predictions of retaliation and probabilities of survival and success, estimates of time before Lord Sin reached the Room of Requirement, and...

She intended to save me, even if it meant sacrificing herself. She couldn't betray me, despite what I represented to her.

She fired the first spell through the hole in the wall, and the pull of her magic sent my mind rocketing back into my own body.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

"_Bombarda Maxima!"_

We had a chance, if we ten could just get rid of enough of the forces. There were a hundred of us waiting in the Room of Requirement. If we could knock down the majority of them and avoid detection, we stood a chance of surviving.

I ran from the hole I'd just cast from before the bodies it'd affected had a chance to fall. I didn't want to kill, but if we wounded them enough to be useless to Lord Sin, he might let them go.

The others didn't fire, just waited to see the result of what I had done. The spell I'd cast was powerful, and when the smoke cleared, I could see the black-cloaked figures whirling and hunting for the source of the blast.

I ran to a different hole before they had the chance to fire on me, watching and waiting to see what they did.

It went silent. They were wary now. Albus and James took up places by the holes in the wall first, casting their own spells. Explosions went off all through the black-cloaked figures.

We'd been taught, in Defense Against the Dark Arts, that killing was only for times of desperation. The old views had changed, after the Second War with Voldemort. Policies on Dark curses had shifted, and training had been either severely lessened or severely heightened in schools.

We'd been trained in how to stop forces like this. You didn't ask questions or give them time to kill you before you killed them.

You got rid of the threat and dealt with the consequences later. Relative, equal force, the laws said. Relative equal force in the face of an attack is acceptable under the law.

These bastards had already shown that they would kill. And so our options were open.

The others joined in after that. We cast, and cast and cast, always moving, always running, always casting something. They cast back, but the walls of the castle were spelled. THe rock regrew. It repaired itself over time.

At least, until Lord Sin came into the battle. We'd knocked down about half of the 200 there were. It still wasn't enough, and now he was angry.

He cast on curse, wandless and silent, at the wall, and it exploded inwards. We were all thrown back in the same, fiery wave and blast the had thrown us earlier that same night in the Great Hall.

And then spells were coming straight at us, and there was no time to think.

_Shield_, I thought, and my magic did. _Don't let them pass. Don't let the others be hurt. _

And they weren't.

The magic stirred, and suddenly, it wasn't difficult to knock the forces down, slice them up, and take their lives. They died because that was what I wanted. Those behind me weren't hurt, because that was what I wanted.

But my magic was out of control.

It whispered in my head, dark and eerie. Told me that it wanted blood and flesh, other magic to gorge itself on. It wanted me to know what it had been, for ten years, to be contained and locked up and forgotten about. What it felt like to be trapped.

I tried to force it down, but it didn't want that. Suddenly, my will didn't matter, and my magic was forcing me back, down and down, until...

I slipped into the dark place.

There was a single second of chaos and absolute peace, silence and noise. There was a second of nothing, of shock, just after that.

And then the dark place just... spilled over. And everything slipped away.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: Chapter Seven: Know Thyself


	7. Know Thyself

**Chapter Seven: Know Thyself**

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

I'd always thought of the dark place as being hot, burning and boiling. It was constantly trying to overthrow my control, and I suppose that made me imagine it as a more... Active place. Heated, maybe. The things I shoved in it were usually red-hot with rage.

But it wasn't. The dark place was freezing, biting cold. There was black snow covering the ground beneath an eerie charcoal sky. There were gray mountains jutting up from the icy ground, rocky and impassable. There were no softness, no shelter, no hiding. No color.

_It's like the world's been drained of everything comforting. _

Snow fell from the ominous, billowing stormheads above me. It was white, unlike everything else here. It was almost pure, almost good in the surroundings. But it turned black the second it touched the ground.

There was nothing. Everywhere I turned, it was barren, dark, and cold.

It was isolation. Isolation at it's worst intensity.

And I was in the center of it.

I realized now how big the dark place was. How much it could hold, how much it could be filled with, how much I'd suppressed. It was immeasurable. It was like trying to fill up all the barren wastelands of the world with individual flakes of snow.

_I somehow managed to fill this entire place with the things that haunted me._

I wandered in the dark place, trying to reach the mountains in the far off distance, to climb up and find my way out of here. Surely I could climb my way out of it, rebind it, contain it again. I'd managed to fit it all in here before, hadn't I?

_But then you let it free Lily. Do you think something will quietly go back to captivity once it's been freed?_

No. I didn't think it would just shut itself back up in the dark place. The memories, the magic, the feelings - They didn't want to go back. They didn't want to be hidden anymore.

But it was my mind. My will. My life. I could fight it and shove it back in. I'd fought harder battles.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

Lily's magic chose to manifest itself as a kitten.

It was a small, black kitten, with white mittens on it paws an adorable spot on its nose. The very tip of it's tail was dipped in white as well, and it had huge, shining, radiant blue eyes. It's whiskers were satiny, perfectly contoured, and adjusted just _so _in its plush, silky fur. Every hair was in place, it's tail wrapped delicately before it's paws. It's ears were canted forward just so, to catch every noise and encourage affection and play. It was collared with a zebra striped ribbon. Said ribbon had a bow on it.

It even had a tiny, white chiming bell.

It's head canted to one side, and it emphasized how small the kitten was. It couldn't have been more than a few months old. It was purring, quite loudly, in a high, rolling tone. It opened its mouth once to mew, and it's voice sounded like that of a tinkling bell.

In short, it was the most adorable thing I had ever seen.

Lily was collapsed behind it. Her robes spilled out around her and her hair covered her face. She looked like the cliche damsel in distress, in a dead faint on the floor.

_Lily isn't a damsel in distress. Well, maybe distress if the dark place has spilled over. But she doesn't need saving._

There was nothing I could do to save her anyway. Lily had thrown me out of her mind, slamming the door closed, locking it, and throwing away the key.

I'd tried to get in. It wasn't a possibility at this point.

She had her own demons to fight. And I...

I had Lord Sin to oppose. His call was getting stronger.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

I'd reached the mountains. They stretched up and up , straight into the clouds. Their sides were sheer cliffs, and there were no footholds. I could see a faint white light ringing round where the clouds and the mountains met. There was a strange tension on the ground at the base. It was a stretch toward the sky, almost like...

_Almost like something's pulling them up from the ground. _

The world tipped onto it's side.

My feet lifted from from the ground, and I had a moment to wonder what the _bloody hell_ was happening before I, the black snow that had been beneath me, the strange storm that had been above me, and the pillar-like mountains that had been before me shifted and fell in the barren, empty space between the former earth and sky.

The grayscale altered around me. I was falling through pitch black emptiness, and then it lightened to the deepest gray, then an almost temperate tone, and finally to pure blinding white. It was in the glaring brightness that I landed.

It was like light was shining from every inch of the surface I was on. There was no shadow, no hiding, just the blinding, almost suffocating whiteness.

What had been the mountains before the fall came next. It was sudden, the once jutting rocks just appearing, and then they were crashing around me, shattering and breaking like stone pillars, but clanging like metal rods and bars against the ground I stood on. I ducked, covered myself in my black robes, but they weren't black anymore. The mountains weren't grey. Everything was white, bright white.

The clouds melted away when they hit the light, forming droplets and falling like a rain of light. They soaked through my cloths, and the white showed everything. When the drops touched my skin, they made it glow from inside, like an ethereal sheet over a bodiless ghost.

The light saw everything that I was. Soul, body, mind, everything. I felt it's touch everywhere. It was not warm, not comforting, but the same harsh, biting coldness as the rest of the dark place.

This was white, shadowless light, and for once, I wished for the ugliness I kept in the dark place, if only so I could hide myself in the horror of it.

And then the snow came.

When it hit the light, I expected it to melt, to instantly switch to white, for something to happen. Nothing did.

It fell, and it fell, and it fell, all over me, all over the light, covering it and drowning it out, until it had completely covered every inch of what I could see.

But I still shone. My hair, my skin, my robes, even my eyes still shone a bright blinding white.

And then the memories came, and I screamed as I had never screamed before.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

Lily's magic kitten was entrancing. It was adorable, soft, innocent. It needed to be protected. It was so young, so tiny, so helpless against all the evil in this place.

So it seemed, until the first of Lord Sin's black-cloaked men touched it.

Teeth sprouted from it's tiny maw, sharp and dripping saliva, it's skin seemed to explode, and it grew and grew and _grew_, until it's very presence filled the room and there was very little air left to breathe. Power burst from it and flowed over us all in waves. It's blue eyes turned white, pure white, and they shone. It's legs and haunches thickened and reformed, until it wasn't feline anymore, but some hulking mix of cat and hellhound. It's voice deepened to a deep, demonic _roar_, and the white was eaten away by the black in it's fur. It bellowed, and it was a cry for blood.

It attacked. It ripped into the man's chest, took his still beating heart, and ate it. It was on the others before he'd fallen to the floor. It was _fast_, it was _strong_, and it was _deadly_.

It was Lily's magic. All of it in all of it's tainted glory, fighting, out of control, powerful and without remorse. It was no wispy formation like a Patronus. This was a real, solid, flesh and blood monster, and it had come to kill.

I did what any true Slytherin would do at that point. As blood spattered across my person and gore rained to the floor, I sprinted to Lily's unmoving, unconscious body, grabbed her, and ran, far, fast, and hard.

I left the monster to it's bloody feast.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

I was just a tiny child. Maybe six.

{"Mummy!" I called, smiling brightly, excited beyond belief. "Mummy, Mummy look! Look what I can do!"

My mum turned, red hair fanning out around her, eyes wide and and wand out. There was something about her, something strange, and it glittered in her gaze.

"Mummy look! Look at all my magic!"

I let the entire mass of my magic go, and it drifted around me in spinning silver and black whorls. It changed the way things looked, shifting the world to a wonderland. There was snow on the ground, with splashes of bright, vibrant red all around. There were people sleeping in the snow, light skinned and ethereal. There was free magic everywhere, and men in bone-white masks and long, dark cloaks. They all had wands, and they shot bolts of light in all directions, most of them a bright beautiful green. When the light connected with the uncloaked people, they fell back to the ground, and all the fear left their eyes. They lay sleeping on the snowy ground with the others.

My magic created something new, and it shone in the background. It thrummed with an invisible sort of tingle, and I saw it was a pale, pale man. He didn't have a nose, and I wondered who had been mean enough to steal it. Stealing wasn't nice. Stealing hurt people. His eyes were red, so he must have been crying a lot. He looked angry and sad.

I raced forward to play with him. When people played with me, I felt better. He was all alone at the other end of the field, except for Papa. Papa was sleeping in front of him like the others were. He'd been hit with a green light too, and now he was sleeping, eyes still open, on the soft cool snow. There were splashes of red around him too, but there was no fear in his eyes. I wondered who had spilled the red on the snowy ground.

The sad, angry man was still a ways off, and I kept running. He was looking at Papa, and there was a strange look in his eyes. I had to look away because I was kind of scared of the look. But it would go away when I played with him right?

"Mummy! You're watching right? Look at all the fun things my magic can make Mummy! It made a whole party just for me!"

I looked away from the red-eyed man to my Mummy, and her eyes were glazed over. Her knuckles were white. One of her hands was in a fist, and the other clenched around her wand.

_Does she want her magic to play with mine? I want to play! Mummy wants to play too!_

She raised her wand up, and so I grabbed the red-eyed man's hand (I'd reached him by now), and I pulled him along with me. We had to play with him too and make him happy. Papa was sleeping, so he wouldn't mind.

Mummy screamed. It wasn't her "come down to dinner" yell, or her "What do you think you're doing!" yell. It wasn't even like the screams Papa sometimes made in his sleep when he dreamt about bad things.

Mummy screamed from terror. But more so, she screamed from rage.

"Voldemort!"

She waved her wind wildly and yelled something I didn't understand, and a light came at me. I didn't move, because I'd seen lights hit other people, and they'd just slept. This one was purple, too, instead of green. The purple ones had to do something different.

It hit me and I screamed. Behind me, the red-eyed man cackled madly, and I saw blood run from his eyes, nose, mouth, and ears as I fell to the snow. I splashed onto the ground with a sharp drip, and I knew I'd always remember the sound.

I was still screaming, and my magic came back into me. It hurt worse than Mummy's light had, but not for long.

Mummy yelled "Crucio" and waved her wand, and everything felt like it was burning and ripping and bleeding, insides bursting out and outsides clawing in, everything twisting until I couldn't even scream.

The red eyed man dissolved into a black mist, and then he followed my magic into me. He cackled next to my silent magic in my head, and then I felt him everywhere, and between the _wrong_ he brought and the pain Mummy cast, I blacked out, too tired and scared to scream.}_Mummy was afraid of me when I was six. It was because my magic is evil. _

{Mummy and Papa were yelling and fighting. Mummy was crying, but she wasn't sad. She was trying to come at me, and she scared me a lot. Papa was trying to hold her back. But Mummy was scared and upset, and she stunned him and pushed him off of her. She looked half-mad. Her eyes changed between fear and anger and lunacy.

She grabbed me by the hair and wrenched my head back. I stared into her eyes because they were al I could see, and the were enraged.

Her words cut like a knife, and she scared me and broke me.

"You're not my daughter. You've a piece of Him in you. Voldemort's in your magic, and I hope he kills you, or I will. You dirty, disgusting mistake. You're repulsive, a leech, just waiting long enough to suck the life out of us before you kill us. I won't let you. I'll kill you first!"

She shook me by the hair, back and forth, again and again. She slapped my face and made me cry. She dragged me outside the house and threw me down in the snow. My blood dripped onto the ground, and it looked like the red splashes of paint my magic had made when the red eyed man was there.

Papa threw off the spell, and I saw him running at Mummy, yelling something, but I was too scared to know what. Mummy kept on coming, and she raised her wand. My fear doubled. Mummy's wand made everything hurt. My magic made Mummy so mad that she hurt me.

"You're evil," she spit at me, and her eyes fairly spit fire. " you're rotten and tainted and dirty. You're magic shows it."

Daddy was almost on her, but I couldn't see him. He had his wand out too, and he was casting something and yelling. It came at Mummy, and she deflected it.

"She's not my DAUGHTER!" She screeched, and spittle went flying. "I should have cut her out of me the day I knew she was there!"

She cast something else, and Papa's spells bounced off of it. Papa was mad too, because all his magic was out, and it dove at what was wrapped around Mummy and me like a red cloud. He roared, and it was almost like a lion, but it didn't work. She just kept coming, and I tried to scramble back and away from her. My had slipped in the blood that had dripped from my split cheek and lip.

She raised her wand at me again, and her eyes were hard and cold.

"Avada Kedav-"

Papa tackled her to the ground, knocked her wand away from him. She screeched and fought at him, and I could see her scratch my Papa's face til it bled.

He didn't care. He looked at me, and his eyes were hard too. "Run Lily," he said, and I did.

I ran to the woods behind my house, and I hid. I climbed the first tree I could find, crying and bleeding and terrified. Splinters stuck in my hands, and my clothes ripped, but I fought my way up the tree until I was far away from the ground.

I could still see every drop of my blood hit the snow. The splash of red stood there, and it was a silent testament to what had happened.}

_Mummy hated me after that day. It was because I held a piece of what had destroyed the things she loved._

{Papa came for me later the next morning. Snow had fallen again, and I was cold, but it didn't matter. It was punishment because I'd made Mummy mad.

He called me down from the tree, but I wouldn't come down. I couldn't go near where the red splash was, because if I did, I'd be more evil, and Mummy would be mad again. She'd be scared and angry again.

Papa Apparated up to where I was in the tree, and he wrapped his arms around me, and he let me just sit there and cry quietly for a little while. In a few minutes, he made me look at him, and he told me what had happened.

"Before you were born, Lily, there were terrible things that had happened. Hundreds of people were killed, and Voldemort took a lot of people your mother loved from her. He almost took me away. He was -"

"Papa, who's Voldemort?"

"He's the greatest evil the world's ever known. Mummy says that you ran to him like an old friend."

"But I only ran to the red eyed man, and he wasn't evil, he was just sad and angry and -"

"Stop. _Never_ speak of the red eyed man, Voldemort, or any of what happened again," he snapped. There was a hissing venom in is voice, and I knew that he meant what he said.

"Mummy's mind couldn't handle seeing... Him again. When you brought out the vision of that battle -"

"But Papa, I didn't, my magic did -"

"Hush."

His cold eyes made me quiet.

"When she saw him in your magic, when she felt the taint of him in the illusion, something broke in her. She can't handle that Lily. She was uncontrollable, all night. That's what He did to her Lily. And you have a piece of him in you. You have to hide it Lily. You're mother is calm now, because of a spell I did."

He looked at me a moment, and his eyes were almost sad.

"You know that I love you Lily. I do. But I can't let your mother break like that again. I love her too Lily, so much. She... I had to protect her from you. From your magic."

He was quiet for a time, and he looked down at the ground. I did too, and while he looked for guidance and peace, I stared at the red, dark accusing splotch f my blood on the ground, and remembered what I'd done. I'd hurt Mummy, even if I didn't know it. Good people didn't hurt the people that they loved. So Mummy was right. Mummy was always right. I _was_ evil.

"Your mother," Papa said after a few minutes, "She... Won't remember you anymore Lily. She won't be able to see her or interact with her. She won't talk to you anymore. It's the best way Lily. She won't be hurt by you, and you won't be hurt because of it. And you're still young enough to change and adapt now. You can learn to live without a mum. And you'll still have me."

He tugged my face around to look away from the splash of blood again, and his eyes were hard, like stone and steel.

"But the spell does not block her memory of the taint on your magic Lily. You must never, _never_ use your magic near her again. Do you understand me? Not even to save your own life."

I stayed silent, because I wanted to cry, but I didn't have tears anymore after the long night. I was tired and Papa's new rules made me feel like I was a grown up now. I had to protect Mummy.

"Your mother is the last thing in my life that I can hold onto Lily. Albus, James, even you will leave. I won't have you anymore. Your mother is the one thing that will make me happy for the rest of my life. I need her. So you have to keep her safe."

_Whatever the cost_, said the silence that followed, _Even if it hurts you._

I nodded. I'd seen that Mummy wasn't able to handle me being there. So I'd just have to be strong enough to handle being invisible.

_I can fight to keep Mummy and Papa happy._}

And so the years went.

{Four years, and I never let my magic out when Ginny was home. I didn't draw attention to myself. I mostly stayed in my room, though it was very small. Papa had let me have the cupboard that was just off the kitchen. He told Ginny it was where he kept his potions supplies, and she never went in there, because he asked not to. He brought me books, and I kept to myself and tried not to make noise. He had me do my chores, and he let me play with Albus and James every once in a while, when Ginny was out. But when she was home, I was in the pantry. I sat, and I read, and I never let my magic out. Not once til I left for Hogwarts.}

But the memories of Hogwarts were already dealt with, the price already paid. The black snow left my eyes, letting me see in the blackness, the shining light beneath my skin still white, still pure, still untainted. I moved forward, and then I was rising, up and up and up through the snow.

I floated, above the black snow but below the glaring, freezing light. For a moment, I thought that I was done, that I was leaving the dark place.

But the light turned black and the snow turned white. The world turned and stood on it's side, one half white and the other black, straight down the center of me.

A door appeared, a tiny little door cut down the middle by the darkness and the light. I ran toward it, and I was running, harder and faster than I'd ever run before, and it was getting farther and farther away.

The line of dark and lights grew sharp, until I could feel the division like a burn on my skin, but I kept running toward that door. Surely, it was my way out. I'd relived the memories, and maybe I could escape before the feelings came for me. If I could just get out of the dark place -

The dark and the light split me in half, and I screamed. Blood rushed, and the world morphed again. I saw the ground splashed with red, like a dark, accusing reminder of what I'd done as a child. It mocked me and it cackled that dry, hissing, terrible laugh of the red eyed man.

The light tugged one half of me away, and the dark another. And in the dark, the shadows rose, with glowing eyes and dripping teeth, and they attacked the dark half like a pack of starving feral dogs.

And the light half was being pulled, away and away and down, always down straight into somewhere foreign and strange, where colors whirled and danced, and quicksilver eyes saw into my soul.

The feelings ate at my dark half. Scorpius's mind drew my light half away.

* * *

><p><strong>The Dark Half<strong>

There was fear.

It was cold, colder than the rest of the dark place, so cold the it burned me and seared flesh from bone. I nearly felt my skin crack open, shatter and bleed.

There was nothing around me but shadows on shadows. There was no light cast and no light to see by, but I _could_ see them, and they _were_ there, dark, hungry, angry. They danced like monsters in the air, a macabre summons to the moribund and the lost. They were everywhere and nowhere, inside and out.

The shadows skittered across my skin, and then dug in their wicked, bloody, poisonous claws.

The pain of it made me mad.

And there was madness, from the pain. There was an insanity to it, the sharp edge of riddles, puzzles, nonsense and delusion that only madness can bring. My mind had been tormented and I hadn't known. There was no love in the world, no safety, no haven, no respite. It was all pain and no escape, but there was always another way out. I could hide the pain - but no, I could make a new place where there was no pain. There'd be puzzles there, to solve, and games to play, and people to play with, but no, I didn't like people because people always hurt me and they were everywhere and there was _no way out_ and it never ended, and the pain, the pain, the wretched, bloody, thrice-cursed, devil-damned pain. And now there were circles and webs spinning round in my head, and I couldn't get through the paths laid out before me because i was falling and rising and spinning and circling and my mind was tearing away from my soul, and the pain, the _pain..._

The madness of it made me furious.

And the fury was right, because what had _I_ done to warrant a monster's brand and a mother's hatred, a father's neglect and a lover's attack? Why was I the one to shoulder the bleeding responsibilities of the world? Why was I the hated leader, chosen for the hardest, darkest, most painful paths and always so angry, so consumingly _enraged_ that I could scarcely breathe with need to destroy? Why couldn't people just love me? Why didn't they care, why didn't they _see_ what I'd been through and what was happening? Why didn't they try to stop it? They saw the scars on my body. Some even knew the scars on my mind, and they hadn't stopped it, and I wanted to rend and tear and break. I wanted to make them _suffer_ for what they'd done, make them suffer _like I had_.

The fury of it made me weep.

Fat tears rolled down my dark half's cheeks, warm in the silent solitude of the frigid dark place. There was nothing around me, no one to hold me or lie to me when they said I'd be alright. My mother hated me, and my father didn't love me enough to let her go. I'd been hidden away like something shameful, forgotten and left to my own devices, thrust into a world I didn't know or understand. How could they smile while I sat alone and ignored? How could I stand it a second longer? My family forgot me. My lover destroy me. I had nothing and no one, because GInny was gone, and Harry would never choose me. Scorpius was terrifying, and Rose was enraged. Raven was gone, and the others would look at me and see a monster. I'd let my magic out, my repugnant magic, the root of all the misery I'd ever felt in my life, and now it would make me alone again. I was trapped.

The sadness of it set me free.

Why shouldn't I be frightened? I was facing a monster, a mass murderer who'd slaughtered children in cold-blood. I'd nearly died, and I _was_ alone in the world. It was a terrifying situation. The fear was justified, and though it clouded my mind, why should I shove it away?

_Its ugly, _my mind said, _and messy. It's not useful, not practical. It doesn't accomplish anything. It's useless. _

But look where hiding it had gotten me.

Why shouldn't I be mad? With the trauma and the years of not dealing with the ugliness I held, why shouldn't I have bloody lost my marbles by now? Less had driven others to madness. I'd been in pain, tortured, neglected, abused, raped, a witness to murder, slaughter, and a killer myself. How much could I be expected to take before I snapped?

_It's weakness. It's ignoble. You should be able to take anything the world has thrown at you and focus through it, live through it. It should make you stronger, hone your will, not send you to the loony bin. _

But look where ignoring it had landed me.

Why shouldn't I be furious? Ginny was an unfit mother, abusive and horrible and weak and wrong. She'd hurt me, more than she would ever know. My father was almost as bad, because he didn't value me enough to force his wife to change. He'd hidden me away like I was his greatest shame, and then told me he loved me. He'd lied, he'd cowered, he'd given in. He'd lost whatever nobility and courage he'd once had. Scorpius had beaten me, raped me, and left me with scars that would never fade and never heal. He'd killed something beautiful and priceless. The pieces were shattered, and my past was a wreck, and he had a part in making it like that. He was to blame too. And so was I. I'd let myself hide because it had been easy, locked my emotions away because it was easier than feeling the pain. I had as much guilt as anyone. I had a right to be angry. Why should I not be allowed to feel it?

_Because it's hideous. It made your mother into a monster, and it'll make you into one too. It alters your judgement. Anger makes mistakes._

But look where suppressing it had lead me.

Why shouldn't I be weeping? What ha happened was tragic, and lives had been ripped apart by it. The person I had been was dead and gone, torn to pieces and left on the cold stone floor of the Room of Requirement. My scars would never heal. I'd never be the same again. There was a call for mourning. Nothing would ever be the same, and lives had been lost that couldn't be regained, and children had died and there was no reason for it. There was no call for my mother to hate me, no reason for my magic to be tainted, no purpose for my rape, no motive for those children to be slaughtered. It was all a tragedy. How could I not be expected to mourn?

_Because there's no time. No purpose. Tears do nothing. They impede your vision and make your skin itch, make your head ache and your nose stuff up and run. They make you shake and feel sorry for yourself, and they get nothing done. They serve no purpose._

But look where holding them in had put me.

The shadows weren't shadows, but feelings, each different, each hidden within the dark place, trapped and abandoned and left to their solitude. They wanted to be felt, wanted to feel, to serve their purpose, for each had one, and to see my purpose be served.

_One in the same_, the shadows whispered, _part of the whole and one in the same._

The shadows tore through the dark place, ripped it open, and flung themselves out. THey flooded into my mind beyond the dark place, the memories with them, and they raced along pathways and neurons and places untouched before by emotions. Everything _felt_, so many things at the same time, and it was new and odd and _different_, and too much.

My dark half was aware, and it was conscious and connected to my body, though my light half was gone. It was _mad, sad, angry, afraid, suppressed but freed and whole, whole again, whole finally, no light half_...

But the magic was missing. The magic was missing, not part of the memories, not in the feelings, but out and away and separate and wrong and _bring it back in and make yourself whole. Hold it dear, hold it close, hold it near, hold it _with you.

and then the magic was back, boiling under my skin, and nothing was cold because it was _hot, so bloody hot, and I never wanted it to be like this, never wanted to feel and remember because it _hurt, _oh Merlin, the _pain.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

Lily's magic was monstrous, tearing men limb from limb, sucking the magic away from their souls and eating their hearts, tearing and rending and wrenching. There were screams, there was blood, there was terror. Spells were fired every which way, from every wand and every man left standing. Lord Sin's grating cackle rose on the air, above the screams and the cracks of spells discharging from wands. The battle raged on.

And then it just.. stopped.

Lily's magic was just...gone. No unstoppable monster or innocent kitten, no faint scent or subtle taint or shifting shadows left. It was just...gone.

Lily started convulsing on the ground.

Her eyes were open and rolling, bloodshot, wide, terrified, and yet only half aware. They weren't green anymore, but the blackest black or the whitest white. They rolled back in her head and then forward again and she shook and convulsed and seized.

Her head hit the floor, and the sound it made, wet and wrong, made me run to her, over the bodies, the blood, and the gore around her.

She was helpless. Again. But this time I could stop it. This time I could save her. This time would be different.

When I touched her, she was burning. Her skin was on fire with the highest heat of fever, but cold tears ran down her cheeks. I tried to keep her still, hold her head away from the ground and get her to stop convulsing, but it didn't work. She was too strong in this state, and the most I could do was drag her away from where the new battle raged. Lord Sin was retreating, having lost too many of his number, but he was fighting till the very end.

I got her onto a rug down the hallway, though she was still shaking and still seizing. Her eyes were in the back of her head now, and all I could see were the whites.

The seizure went on, and I was frantic to find some way to stop it.

* * *

><p><strong>The Light Half<strong>

_It's very different here,_ I thought as I drifted through the mirrors and the halls of Scorpius's mind. _There isn't much color - blacks, whites, grays. And the mirrors are disturbing. Does he want to see every part of himself, every second of the day? There's no hiding. _

Scorpius had no dark place. There was no section that was forbidden, no place to hide secrets or feelings. The bad mixed with the good, and the single, quicksilver orb that floated beside me saw it all, and judged it all, and knew all of what was in his mind.

_I'm terrified_, I thought, _he can see me. _All_ of me._ _How can he not _hide _things?_

No answer came. But the fundamental difference between his mind and mine was almost as disturbing as it was discouraging.

_I'm the hopeful half, the optimistic half, the normal girl without the dark place aren't I? Then why is it that there's no hope for us? We're too different. How can he even care if I live or die when I have so much that I hide from him, so much I have to work through, so many scars that will never heal? _

The outlook was dismal, no doubt. I had nothing to offer him, and nothing with which to garner favor. I was broken, after all.

_Broken and his. So says the name carved down your spine._

The quicksilver orb next to me rippled ominously at that thought, but it stayed calm still. It had followed me the entire time I wandered through the halls, and every so often it would shift or shiver. It frightened me a little, but I felt safe here. This was Scorpius's mind, after all. He wasn't under the influence of Lord Sin.

There were memories floating around in the halls, and they were happy, whole, not dark and repulsive like mine. The walls got darker as I wandered longer, and the breezes shifted down the halls, changing from the light, happy, dancing breeze on the surface to a chilling cold gale.

And, in the same manner, the memories darkened. There weren't many of them - only two - but they were long and I knew nothing of them.

Curiosity struck me, and though I'd touched none of the memories up to this point, I touched one of these. What were these memories that were stored in the darkest part of his mind? What could possibly make his mind tend toward darkness so much?

My fingers sank into the soft, cool memory, and I was drawn in.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

{I knew that something was wrong when my father came home that day. He shoved me into my room, locked me in, and wouldn't speak to me. But I heard him pacing, crying, sometimes screaming. He kept saying something about "not again, not now, it was supposed to be over". When I managed to look out the keyhole to see him, I saw him hunched over, shirt off, clutching his left forearm.}

I was seven then, and I felt as helpless now as I had that day. Lily had been seizing for minutes now, and I didn't know how to stop it, just as I hadn't known how to stop my screaming father then.

{He disappeared with a crack and a last scream of agony and rage. I stayed locked in the room, though I tried every method I knew to get out. Mother was gone to Grandmother's house for the day, and I was trapped, alone and helpless. It was the worst kind of feeling.

Wen he cam back, it was hours later, and I was still locked helplessly in the room. He Apparated in, and at first I though that he had fallen.

He hadn't. He was on the floor, and he was seizing. A great sinister snake floated darkly above him, striking again and again at his head. It was the snake from the Dark Mark, and it was attacking his mind.

I screamed. My father was on the floor, convulsing and crashing about helplessly, and I was locked in a room. There was blood all over him, and I knew that if he kept bashing into the floor, his bones would break.

But I could do nothing. I was helpless and locked in the nursery of all places, with Medusos. He was crying and screaming, and so was I, because we both knew something terrible had happened.

And then my arm started to burn.}

This was not the time for memory. Not when Lily was still convulsing and there was nothing to hold her still. I wanted to Stupefy her, but I ad no idea what that would do to her mind, Her skin was getting hotter and hotter and she was crying silently and helplessly.

I thought she was going to die.

{Father quieted after what seemed like hours. He was still on the floor, just in sight through the key hole. He wasn't moving, and I couldn't see the rise and fall of his chest.

My arm was still burning, and it was worse than before.

Medusos had stopped screaming, and now he was just making tiny hiccuping noises. I had no idea what to do with him. He was so small, born early, and I felt that with all the horrible things of today, I would break as soon as touch him. It was a terrible, horrible feeling, a new helplessness not of separation, but of ignorance.

I sat in a corner of the room, far away from anything else, and cried till mother got home.}

Lily was quieting. I'd gotten her onto her side and she'd stopped convulsing violently. Every so often, she'd stiffen or twitch, but she was mostly quiet now. She hadn't spoken as of yet, but her eyes were moving, and they'd mostly settled on me. Tears still rolled down her cheeks, and her skin still burned.

For a time, I sat with her and stroked her hair. The battle was done, Lord Sin gone, and the others had returned to the Room of Requirement to let the others know what had happened.

I sat among the ruins with her, and I held her close until the shakings had stopped and she could speak and move again.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

_I...can't see anything_.

It was true. I knew that my mind was consciously in my body and not in Scorpius's any longer. I'd not gotten to see the second memory. But it could wait.

_I can't speak either._

I wanted to tell him that I was sorry for the little boy who'd seen the father he adored brought to his knees and sick. I wanted to tell him that he should have told me. That I hadn't meant to leave him for dead, and that I'd always meant to save him.

But I couldn't. Couldn't see, couldn't speak, couldn't move.

He was cradling me, stroking my hair and holding my hand and whispering stupid things, little lies that made me feel safe and cared for regardless. I knew everything wasn't going to be alright, that I hadn't done well, that things weren't going to be ok again. He said the anyway, and for a second, I believed him.

_I...hurt._

My entire body ached. From my head to my toes, I was one giant sore spot. Everything felt too sharp, too rough, too clear, too _much_, and that was just the physical sensation.

Emotionally I was...terrified. What had just happened, to the dark half and the light half?

_What had just happened to me?_

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note <strong>

Next: Of Running and Reconciliation


	8. Of Running and Reconciliation

**Chapter 8: Of Running and Reconciliation**

* * *

><p><strong>Raven<strong>

It was very dark, and very dry. The air shifted like smoke from a fire, but there was no heat and no light.

There was the voice though. The voice that whispered a thousand unknown things.

I didn't know what it was saying, nor where it was. It was everywhere and nowhere, sometimes within, sometimes without, and always, _always_ whispering to me.

There were no words. No meaning. Just constant, pressing sound.

I'd been captured by whatever had attacked Hogwarts. And this place was to be my prison.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

It seemed like a lifetime had passed since I first stood here, looking at the castle in shock and awe, captivated by something I had never seen before.

In first year, I'd had been in a rickety boat floating silently along the lake. The castle had stood, silent, safe, tall and majestic. The windows had glowed with a bright cheery light, and I'd been proud. Proud of being one of the few chosen for Hogwarts, proud of being with the other first years, proud of my magic and myself and my family. Proud to be a wizard.

Now I stood before the castle, and I watched as the stones fell from the towers, the windows shattered and blew out, and the ground smoldered and burned.

There was nothing left. Hogwarts was gone, just another falling, smoking skeleton that Lord Sin left in his wake. It was tragic, and it sent a bolt of finality through us all. As we loaded ourselves into the boats that had brought us here, all those years ago, we watched the once proud castle crumble to ruin.

Lily was stumbling along beside me, tired and stiff. There was blood dripping from one of her ears, and I knew that we needed to get her to a healer. I don't know what had happened, but ears weren't supposed to bleed. Whatever it was, it could kill her.

We piled in the boats. There were some people that resisted leaving, thinking that staying with their dead was more important.

It wasn't. Medusos' body meant nothing to me. He wasn't there. His spirit was gone. A cold, rotting body wouldn't do any of us any good.

Now we had to care for the survivors.

Lily was too tired for it, and infinitely too traumatized, but she stayed with me to comfort the grieving and get everyone into the boats. She stumbled and shook, but she wasn't seizing, and she wasn't sleeping. I knew nothing about medicine, but I knew that I couldn't leave her alone.

She still hadn't spoken a word. She shook, but it was with cold and exhaustion, not convulsions. She cried, but it wasn't hysteria, just a calm, quiet kind of mourning. It worried me. If she was still wouldn't speak to me, after the events of the past six hours, who would she talk to?

_Has it only been six hours,_ I thought, _since Hogwarts stood, tall and proud? Six hours it took Him, to destroy hundreds of lives._

It was terrifying really. It made me want to cry and mourn and hide. But the reality was, there was no place to hid, no time to cry, and no reason to mourn - at least not yet. This was just the beginning of what was to come from Lord Sin. I'd mourn after the end, after it was over.

The boats took us away, gliding across the black waters of the lake. I tried not look back, tried not to think about Medusos being gone, about Hogwarts falling, or people dying, or Medusos being gone forever, a bright light snuffed out by something evil.

I tried not to think of what had happened to Lily. Tried not to think of all the times I'd almost died. Instead, I held Lily as she clung to me, and I stroked her back as she cried.

I tried to ignore the grim satisfaction of knowing that the scars I felt there, carved into her skin, spelled the letters of my name.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

The train was there when we got across the lake. There were some teachers on it, though I had no idea where they'd been during the battle. Maybe fighting in another part of the castle? It didn't matter for long, because I drifted of to sleep the moment Scorpius curled up with me in our compartment.

I woke at St. Mungo's, for a little while. They said something about "exhaustion of the magical core, possible brain damage, and a psychological break." Honestly, I wasn't lucid enough to understand. I knew that Scorpius's hand was in mine, and that I could smell him on my sheets, and that was enough. I fell back into a fitful, nightmarish sleep.

The second time I woke, it was for a few hours. There were people fighting outside my room, yelling and hollering, and a nurse trying to calm them down. One sounded like my father. I tried to ignore the possibility of seeing him; too many memories resurfaced when I thought about it, too much pain.

_Is it natural to avoid painful memories? Or are you supposed to feel all the pain of them, face them and try to heal?_

I didn't know. Feeling anything felt like it was wrong. For the longest time, I'd tried not to feel a thing.

I struggled to sit up so I could flip my pillow over to the cool side, and that's when I noticed my injuries. There were dark, ugly bruises marring my entire body, scratches and lacerations everywhere, and when I moved, it felt as if my skin would peel away from my bones. I didn't remember taking any damage in the fight - but then, I didn't remember much of anything from the...

How long had it been since the battle?

_How long has it been? How long have I missed? Where is everyone? Who survived?_

_Why can't I _remember?

My hands fell back to my sides and the pillow must have knocked into something, because a few seconds later, there was the sound of glass breaking. I didn't notice as the crystal shards of a vase scattered across the floor, and I didn't see the lilies that littered the ground, impaled on the glass. The yelling stopped, I'm sure, and someone tried to open the door.

My magic reached out, no longer hiding just below my skin, and kept the door closed. _No people_, I kept thinking. _I can't be vulnerable like this in front of anyone. Why can't I_ remember? _Why can't I remember a single bloody thing? _

There were important things from the battle that I needed to know. I'd done something, learned something, found something out that I _needed_ to know, and now it simply wasn't there. I remembered the sensation of a dreadful wrenching and tearing, that it was horrible and that there'd been an agony like I'd never known, but I couldn't remember what "it" was.

"Lily," a soft voice called from the other side of the door, "Lily, it's alright. You're safe. I'll come in and explain everything, but you've got to get control of your magic."

The voice was familiar and oddly comforting. _He's been yelling,_ I thought. His voice had a raspy quality that wasn't usually present, but I recognized it. I'd heard it before...

_Yes, in the nightmare. He was the man who hurt me in the nightmare_.

I'd remembered it, from when I'd been sleeping. The nightmare had been painful and violating, filled with blood and rape and pain. The man had screamed himself hoarse, though he was usually calm and quiet. He'd done horrible things to me, cut me and burned me and carved his name down my spine...

_But that was a nightmare. He couldn't be here._

I relaxed, no longer afraid. Something that horrible could only be in night terrors, not reality. No one would hurt me like that, no one was that evil, that cruel and twisted. I'd done nothing wrong, after all. I'd tried to keep from hurting people all my life.

My magic curled back slowly, settling into a calm, warm presence under my skin. As long as I stayed calm, it was content to curl under my skin. It was unrestrained and quiet, a calm waiting presence, like a kitten curled in the sun.

The door opened, and the man with the raspy voice walked in, shutting the door in the faces of the two men trying to follow behind him. His robes were black and torn, like he'd been in a battle, but his skin looked clean, his hair washed. He was very pale, with platinum blonde locks and quicksilver eyes.

He was the man from my nightmares. He was here.

_Because they weren't nightmares. That's your reality Lily, and it's filled with pain._

The rape, the torture, the subsequent months, the breakdown, the battle... all of it was real. The events started aligning into a painfully obvious timeline of how my life had descended into this pitiful state. Suddenly the flimsy patient's robes, the sterile room, and the total lack of personal effects made sense. I was in St. Mungo's, after the battle at Hogwarts. My magic had unleashed itself, the dark place had taken over me, and my mind had been torn in two. I'd been forced to feel every emotion I'd ever suppressed, face every memory I'd hidden away. And Scorpius...

I'd raped his mind.

I'd entered into his mind without permission. I'd flitted through his head like it was my right, trampled through the pathways there, and forced myself into his darkest memories.

It was wrong. It was violating. What he'd done to his body, I'd done to his mind.

_I bear his name on my body, and those scars will never fade. Now he bears my mark on his memories and in every pathway of his mind. We're even. _

The irony was almost painful.

He'd crossed the room now to sit on the bed, but he hadn't said a word. It seemed like pain permeated the air around us. This was the first time we'd seen each other without expecting to die within the hours ahead.

We sat quietly for a minute, just staring at each other. _Who's weaker,_ the silence said. _Who will break the silence first? Where can either of you possibly begin?_

But none of those questions were the right one. The base of the matter was, which one of us needed the other more? Despite everything, which one of still loved the other, cruelly and desperately? Which one of us would sacrifice everything we were for the person sitting on the other side of the white sheets?

He spoke first.

"I'm sorry that I wasn't here when you woke up. No, I'm sorry for more than that. I'm sorry that I brought you into the unmitigated, horrendous mess. I'm sorry you've been hurt because of it, and that it's destroyed us both, but especially you. I've brought this down on you with my bad blood, because of a Mark and a loyalty I never would have chosen. I've ruined you, and I've watched you dying slowly everyday - because of something I've done. If I'd been stronger, or smarter, or just something _more,_ you would have been safe. You did nothing to deserve this catastrophe, and I've done nothing to deserve you - not your sympathy, not your attention, not your forgiveness; I have to ask for it though, because Medusos is dead, Father is missing, my life is in shambles, and you're the only thing I've ever had for myself. Everyone is looking to me, the press, the survivors, the politicians, the victims, other families that have been affected, the whole bloody world, and bloody hell I can't do it without you because you're-"

I shot to my knees and clapped my hand over his mouth before he could continue.

"Please, Scorpius, just shut your mouth and listen to me for once."

I loosened my grip after a moment, and he stayed quiet. I settled back into the pillows, and he sat silently while I arranged my thoughts. It wasn't tense, as all the silences between us had been since the attack. The quiet was comfortable. Natural enough to seem like the past months in hell hadn't been real.

"Your name is still carved into my skin."

He flinched at that, turned toward me and opened his mouth to speak. "Lily, I-"

"Shut your mouth and let me talk Scorpius. Don't open your mouth again until I'm done."

He fell back to the pillows on his side slowly. The distance across the bed seemed endless, the white sheets separating us as effectively as a wall.

"I have scars down my spine, and they spell your name. Do you remember what you said, when you were carving them? I don't imagine so.

"You told me you loved me, so many times the words lost their meaning. You said everyone would know what you'd done to me, know that I was yours, your bitch, your whore, your slut, your slave... all yours.

"But that's not true. Not entirely, at least. I'm not your bitch, and I never will be. I'll never be your whore or your slut - I may never be able to let you touch me again, because I'm still terrified of you. It's true Scorpius, no matter how much you shake your head or deny it. The scars on my body will never fade.

"I'll never be your slave, because I've changed too much to mindlessly follow you. But I will always be yours. You broke me when you raped me. You trained me and tuned me to only recognize you. Every time another man touches me, I'm terrified. I get nauseas, I shake and sweat, and my body goes cold. My skin crawls.

"It's the same with my mind. We're linked Scorpius, and the concept of someone knowing my thoughts as well as you do terrifies me. You're the only one that I'll ever have Scorpius, because despite the torture and the rape and the bloody catastrophe you've made my life into, I still trust you in some sick and twisted corner of my mind. You've destroyed me so thoroughly that I'll never trust anyone but you again.

"And I think I'm at peace with that. Its cruel and warped, but it is what it is. If you're the only one I'll trust, I feel I should be taking advantage of that. You haven't hurt me, haven't lied to me - not really. This has been out of your control as much as it's been out of mine. You've made horrific mistakes with me; but then, I've done the same with you. You refused to acknowledge that what happened hurt me, or that I was terrified. You had your pride, and that was what mattered.

"But I ran from you. I wouldn't listen to you, and I wouldn't look at you. I let my fear control me, and that was the one thing you asked me to never do. I failed you. You failed me. You raped my body, but I raped your mind, and I don't know which is more sacred. We're even - we have a chance to forget the past and start over. I don't want to forget what happened; how could I - could you - when we'll always be wearing the scars? But I don't want what happened to stop me anymore. I'm tired of waiting to heal, being afraid, feeling that my future is going to be empty and cold and alone. I want something different. I want..."

_You don't know what you want Lily. You haven't known since the attack. You're his. Your mind, your body, everything you are, and he made damn sure of it. _

"I want what you want Scorpius." _Because I'll never want something for myself again._

The silence fell again, and I didn't know what it held this time. It was tense, strained, painful even. I'd trusted him with everything - the ridiculous feelings and the anger and this blind devotion that I still had to him. Everything that was left of me was his, and he had to know it. Right or wrong, he had to know.

The silence went on, and he made no move to speak. I couldn't bring myself to look him in the eyes, but I couldn't pull my eyes away from where his heart lay beating in his chest. I was afraid, because I'd never spoken to him like this before. Even before the attack, we'd never spoken about feelings. We knew how we felt, and we knew how the other felt. We'd never put a name to it, never talked about it openly.

_He could rip out my heart right now, and I'd let him. He must be disgusted with me, giving myself to him like this. He must think I'm weak if I can't stand on my own._

The silence went on.

_How much longer do I have to sit here, chest open and bleeding, waiting for him to tell me to leave? Why won't he say something? Why do I have to wait, to sit here and die while the seconds slip away? Say something Scorpius. Say anything._

The silence went on.

_Tell me I'm worthless. Leave. Hold me. Anything. Please, just say something. Do something._

I couldn't stand it anymore. The minutes ticked by, and it must have been a lifetime of silence and waiting. The white sheets mocked me, and the distance across the bed was a chasm. I'd waited too long. Memories flashed in front of my eyes: every time he'd tried to explain, every time I'd run, every step away from each other we'd taken.

The bed shifted, and I looked at him expectantly, but he hadn't moved at all. It was me, this time, who was crawling back to him, as he'd done that day on the train. He'd sacrificed his pride to come back to me.

But now it was my turn to beg.

I found myself next to him, afraid to touch him and sure I'd do something wrong. What if I broke what little we had left between us? He'd told me everything I'd ever done wrong during the attack. There were so many mistakes. What if this was another one? Was he angry? Disappointed? Repulsed?

I dropped my eyes again, rather than letting them rise to his. I looked at his hands, hands that had held me and hurt me. He had scars on them now, though he hadn't before. They were clenched into fists, and his knuckles were whiter than his pale, perfect skin. It frightened me, to see his fists again, but I didn't care. He had to speak. I had to know.

"Please?" I begged him, and my voice sounded small, weak, and terrified. This was unbearable. After all the weeks and months of silence and anger between us, when I finally let myself trust and feel again, it was too late. Tears flooded my eyes. Was I really this pathetic, this broken? _Theres nothing in me worth having anymore_.

His hands shot out, one burrowing into my hair, the other a steel band around my waist. He dragged me to him and buried his face in my hair. I felt warm, wet drops hit my scalp.

"Don't ever think that aga-" he began, but the door flew open and crashed into the wall behind it, interrupting him.

When I saw who stood there, I nearly hid behind Scorpius. Of all the times and places for for Scorpius' father to find out about us...

He stood in the doorway, expression cold and indifferent, not a platinum hair out of place, and his eyes flitted between Scorpius' hands in my hair and the way I pressed into him in fear. His skin looked ashen and there were dark bruises beneath his eyes. Death, it seemed, had not been a very distant possibility for Draco Malfoy in the recent past. Scorpius had mentioned he was missing. Perhaps he'd just escaped Lord Sin?

He sneered, and I shivered. Scorpius had worn the same expression the night he'd been controlled by Lord Sin. His father, it seemed, sought to terrify me with it of his own free will.

"Hello Father," Scorpius began, his arms tightening about my waist and his hand in my hair guiding me closer to him, giving me a place to hide. "What, may I be so bold as to ask, brings you to Lady Potter's room?"

I was Lady Potter? I vaguely remembered my father mentioning it when I was younger, explaining that Ginny was Lady Weasley, and that the title fell to me. I'd never been addressed by it before.

"Come Scorpius. We're leaving this," he paused, looking pointedly at the cold, sterile surroundings, "Establishment."

"I'm happy to see you as well Father. I'll gather Lily's things and we'll follow-"

"That girl clinging to you so repulsively will stay here. I will not have her in my home. I will not have her near you."

Scorpius tensed, and gave me an inscrutable look just before he took his arms away. He stood, dumping me unceremoniously on the bed.

My heart shattered. I'd laid myself bare to him, and now at a single word from his father, he left me?

_Worthless, Lily. Haven't you learned what you are yet? Ginny didn't want you, and Scorpius doesn't either._ The thought brought tears to my heart, ripped what little pride I had left out of my body.

"Then I'll be staying here Father. I'm of age, and I battled to save hundreds of lives only three days ago. I've proven myself capable, and legally, I can do as I please. I won't leave Lily again."

_What?_ My heart soared, and I tried to crush it back down before the punchline of what had to be a joke came. Scorpius would never choose me over his Father.

His father leveled a glare at him that could freeze hell over. It was glacial, and it looked like it would strip Scorpius' skin of his bones. "You won't leave her?" he snarled icily. "So this is the tart you've been pining over, the one clouding your mind and disturbing your studies? It is shameful beyond all standards Scorpius, and I will not have it. A Potter? Tell me, are you trying to escape the shame of your family and it's Mark? Or are you so willing to crawl back to the very people who caused this mess originally, like a dog to a master?"

He'd barely finished his sentence when a curse hit the doorframe next to him. _Bombarda_ blasted away part of the wall, scattering pieces everywhere and throwing a cloud of dust into the air.

"The next one will be at your head." I'd never heard Scorpius so angry or icy. "I love her, Father, like you loved Mother. If you insult her again, I'll hex your skin to paper and your bones to glass. Get. Out."

His Father's expression hadn't changed, but there was a new gleam in his eyes. "You'll never know what your Mother and I had between-"

"OUT!" Scorpius roared.

His father turned on his heel and was gone. I sat, staring at the hole in the doorframe, dumbfounded. What had just happened? What had Scorpius just said?

He settled on the bed again, slowed his breathing, tried to calm himself. I watched the hole in the frame, comparing it to the one in me. I'd had my heart beaten, bloodied, broken, ripped out, shredded, replaced, and revived, all in the space of an hour. I'd never felt so emotional, so wildly out of control of myself before. I was afraid of it, and I was confused. What new thing would I feel now? What else could there possibly be?

His arms had somehow managed to wrap around me and drag me against him, his hand had magically wrapped into my hair. I watched the doorframe still. He'd nearly killed his father, just now. What would he do to me?

"I love you Lily."

My heart stopped beating, and I couldn't breathe. My skin tingled and my eyes teared. I'd never felt this before. Was it blind terror? Raging anger? What else could I possibly feel?

"I've know that since you threw your shoe at me on the way to the train in first year. It's grown, and it's changed to the point that I don't think I can let you go. I'm yours." He sighed, and it was almost weary, nearly elated. "You've bewitched me, Lily, body and soul, and I love you."

He bent his head, resting it in the crook of my neck, holding me tight enough to crush me. I wasn't afraid. I was his, wasn't I? He could do what he wanted to me, and I'd still go to him willingly. There was too much between us for me to ever leave.

_And he loves me._ The breathless, heart-stopping all-consuming feeling was back. What was it? Why didn't I know?

"Do you love me?" he murmured against my ear, his voice the intimate rumble he'd used with me so many times before. The feeling grew. My chest was tight, nearly painful, and I felt like I would burst. What was this emotion? Why couldn't I put a name to it? It was warm and soft, but strong enough to stop my heart and steal my breath. It made me feel like I'd follow him across an ocean, off a cliff, anywhere he asked. I'd kill for him, and if he died, it felt like I would too. Losing him... I'd never truly lost him before. But I remembered being separated from him, and the bone deep ache it brought. If he died, I'd do everything in my power to follow.

That sounded like love. It felt like it.

"Yes," I whispered, and I couldn't tell if it was mind to mind or spoken.

"Then you're mine," he rumbled, just before he stole a searing kiss.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: Chapter Nine: First Light, Second Strike


	9. First Light, Second Strike

Chapter Nine: First Light, Second Strike

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

"A week," asserted the Healer, a tiny, twiggy girl who was dwarfed unflatteringly by her robes, "At least. No visitors, no stress. You will _sleep._ Your mind and body are frail and weak."

That, quite obviously, had not happened. That twiggy little girl was small enough for me to break, and I had seen the way her eyes molested Scorpius. Not only was she sexually assaulting my - whatever Scorpius was - in her mind, but she had insulted me. I took great pride in my mind, and it was _not_ weak, and never would be. I knew more about healing magic than that thick, unattractive stick ever would, and I'd dealt with things she couldn't imagine.

And my body was just _fine._ I'd fallen out of trees and off brooms and through windows and into walls my entire life. I was a respectable witch after all. I'd been in my fair share of duels - and now battles.

_I look better to Scorpius than you ever will_, I thought as the stick wiggled her disgustingly flat and boney hind out of my room. I was _his,_ after all, and he was mine now.

She could go hex herself. Thoroughly.

The visitors rule was broken immediately; Scorpius staunchly refused to leave my side, and when they tried to remove him physically, he cursed them all soundly. No one had bothered him since. The entire clan of Weasley's - not just Rose's immediate family, but Charlie's, and Bill's, and George's, and the cousins and the grandparents and what seemed like a whole country of Weasley's - had come to thank me for saving Rose, though I hadn't done anything. We mourned for Madeline together though.

Mr. Malfoy came back, once he heard of Medusos' fate. Scorpius had spoken with him, quietly in a corner, and they'd both seemed terribly upset. Eventually, though, his father's grief turned to anger at me, and Scorpius threw him out.

Papa had come to see me - well, _tried _to. Ginny, of course, had not.

Scorpius hadn't known what happened with my mother; only Papa and I knew about the spell, though Albus and James saw the effects of it. But during the first few days at the hospital, we talked of everything. He wanted to know about what had happened in my mind, what had made my magic spill out. And the dark place. He wanted to know everything about the dark place.

It was painful to tell him. Emotionally draining and shameful and filled with everything I'd ever hated about myself. I did it anyway; he deserved to know. My pride didn't matter when it came to him. I cried and I laughed and I hit him and flew into rages and depressions, and the healers tried to get him removed and arrested, tried to transfer me to a mental ward. None of it worked; I was in the grip of the dark place for days, trying to purge all of it and tell Scorpius everything, and my magic made sure no one got in.

I was almost sorry for whoever had tried the door. I'd heard they were in a mental ward themselves.

Scorpius knew everything, and he was as volatile as I was during those days. I spent a lot of my time curled up in a corner, utterly terrified of him. I kept talking anyway, while he threw things and paced and hexed walls - he'd ordered me too, and I was his after all.

Now he knew. He knew about my mother, my father, my childhood ("Spent trapped in a bloody fucking kitchen closet like an animal," he'd said, right before he'd held me and promised we'd have the biggest house in all of Britain), and... the attack.

I'd never seen Scorpius look quite as ashamed and disgusted as when I went through the attack. He'd never known what he did - not all of it. The Imperius Curse he was under had wiped most of his memory of that time clean.

So when Papa came to see me, a week after I'd been admitted to the hospital, things got... hostile.

Scorpius opened the door, though he had to have known who was there. He could sense magic, had even taught me how to, and Papa's magic was hard to miss. He'd been civil at first, polite even, asking after Papa's health, how my family was, how his week had been.

Papa had apparently spent the entire week trying to comfort Ginny. The thought of an attack like this on her precious boys, the notion that she could have lost _more_ people she loved, had nearly broken her mind, and he'd had to protect her and pick up the pieces.

Scorpius had slammed the door in his face, and then proceeded to hex everything in my room to pieces. He'd avoided my side of the room, and he'd repaired everything. But Papa had felt the magic, and he thought Scorpius was killing me, or something to that effect. He'd attacked the door with every spell he knew, and I'd been hard-pressed to keep it closed. Papa was very, very strong.

He'd begged me, ordered me, bargained with me, and finally threatened me to open the door. It hadn't worked - I was Scorpius', and no one else had a hold on me. I'd told him to leave.

When he didn't, Scorpius had nearly cast the Unforgivables. I'd had to calm them both down, and the hospital staunchly refused to remove the man who killed Voldemort from the hospital for trying to see is own daughter.

He'd left eventually. Ginny needed him, after all. He'd assured me that we'd discuss this later, and that my mother would be ashamed of me.

_If she remembered I existed,_ of course.

And so, Scorpius and I were left relatively alone, to discuss what our next move was. I was released nine days after the battle, but neither of us could go home. We'd chosen each other - and that meant we hadn't chosen our families.

We needed somewhere secure, somewhere isolated, and somewhere huge. If we were going to war - which we were - we'd need housing for the forces we could gather, training grounds for the people we could amass, and a lot of space to fortify against attack. Lord Sin wasn't going to disappear. My father, during his infuriated ranting outside my door, had made it quite clear that, while tragic, there was no way Lord Sin was responsible for the attack against Hogwarts. Lord Sin, after all, didn't exist.

We'd get no help from him. And if Harry Potter wouldn't fight against the rising evil, no one else would. It was disgusting. They'd let the deaths of hundreds of children go, simply because they didn't want another war, couldn't conceive of a worse evil than Voldemort. They thought if they didn't see it, it didn't exist.

And so we'd have to amass the younger generation. Those of us at Hogwarts would fight, and I was sure that we could persuade some of Durmstrang and Beauxbatons to fight. Especially after the mews of these past nine days.

Every wizarding school, in countries world wide, had been hit. The Americans were already arranging forces - they were particularly sensitive to being attacked on their home soil - and some of the African countries were amassing people willing to fight. Most of the world was still in shock; it was understandable. The newest generation of wizards and witches, worldwide, had been all but obliterated. The world was grieving for their children, siblings, friends. But there were a select few who were rising, ready to fight and attack and _destroy_ whatever this wretched evil was that was stalking the planet.

No one was safe. And it seemed that the children were the only ones who realized it.

So we needed a place to gather, assemble forces, and train until we knew we were ready, until we could strike.

Scorpius offered up the Manor.

His father refused to live there, after the war. The Malfoys were owners of extensive property, and though most of their wealth and land had been stripped from them after the war, Papa had ensured that they weren't destitute. After that, Scorpius' father had done a spectacular job of cleaning up the family name, rebuilding their fortune, regaining their properties. He'd gone to live in Scotland, somewhere near Hogwarts, in a near palatial castle.

The Manor had been abandoned and left directly to Scorpius, to ensure that he would have somewhere to go immediately should something... happen... to his father.

Mr. Malfoy, after all, was nothing if not careful, prepared, and exceedingly paranoid.

And so, to the Manor we went directly after my release.

* * *

><p><strong>Scorpius<strong>

My father had told me stories, when I was younger, about the beauty and elegance of the Manor. But after years of disuse, it had fallen into shambles. It still stood, tall and sturdy and proud, of course; the interior was the problem.

Dark things haunted every floor and room. There were Boggarts and doxies everywhere, ghouls in the attic and Augeries living in the overgrown savage gardens. Ashwinders had nested relatively recently in the basement, and Bundimuns were slowly rotting away the foundations of the house.

I'd never understood how difficult it must have been, before the Ministry lifted the ban on underage magic, for Wizarding children to be independent. I did, after two weeks of copious magic, trying to stabilize the Manor and make it presentable.

Lily insisted on facing the Boggarts - all of them, every last one. She spent the first two weeks at the Manor absolutely terrified, shaking and flashing back and recovering repressed memories. It hurt me to watch it happen, but it destroyed me when she forbade me to help her.

"I have to," she'd said. "If I submit now and let you protect me, I'll never be anything but submissive again. I need to be terrified, to scream and rage and cry and shatter. I have to because I have to break before I can fix myself."

"I can help you Lily. This is exactly like it was before, this stubborn pointless insistence on being independent and strong." And it was. This was what we'd fought over, a thousand times before, what had kept us apart for so long. I told her as much.

Her eyes hardened, and the newfound light in them faded back to the cold, dead darkness it had been before. Her expression flit between agony, sadness, and contempt, and the look shattered my heart. But dammit, she'd hurt me. After everything I'd done for her, she still didn't trust me. I'd given up my secrets, my trust, my future, my _family_ for her, and the ungrateful wretch wouldn't let me help her?

"My entire life has been a fight Scorpius," she said, and her voice was ice cold and filled with contempt. "Every second, every single relationship and interactions I've had has been a battle, and I've always been alone. My parents deny me, the world reviles me, and _you -_"

"I _what_ Lily. You won't trust me with _anything._ You flinch every time I touch you, cower when I start to yell, and if I so much as reach for my wand without warning you, you look at me like I'm a monster. Why the hell can't you just _trust me_ -"

I took the time to look her in the eyes then, and the words stuck in my throat. Her eyes were huge, shining and flooded with tears, but spitting and glowing with anger. Her head was held high, and her spine was stiff, but she was shaking like a leaf, so fragile that a passing breeze might have broken her.

Her voice never wavered when she spoke, and her whisper vibrated through the room, threaded with the steady, powerful thrum of her magic. She was nearly out of control, and she was both terrifying and entrancing. I'd never seen a more frightful beauty.

"The last time you raised your voice at me was to call me a bitch and a whore. The last time you touched me, you made me bleed and scream. The last time you used your wand near me, it was to flay my skin from my bones. My memories of you are torture, rape, and pain Scorpius." She was crying now, tears streaming down her cheeks, but her head was high, and she was clinging desperately to what little strength she had.

"If you love me," she drove on, "you'll let me heal the only way I can; you'll leave me to fight my way out of this disgustingly pitiful place I'm in. I love you, but you don't know me anymore. You don't know what I need. Leave me to my fight, or leave me altogether Scorpius."

She hadn't spoken to me since that day. I didn't see her inside the Manor, and I didn't know where she went every day. But every night, she'd slip into my room, crawl under my blankets, and sleep in my arms.

By the time I woke, she'd be gone. And so it went on, for a month.

And then _they_ started to come, determined and grieving, and ready to fight.

* * *

><p><strong>Raven<strong>

The smoke wasn't smoke, and the whispers weren't whispers.

The smoke was alive, part of something, though I didn't know what. But it was made of anguish, agony, torment, sorrow, grief, rage loss, and above all, an endless, destructive evil.

I'd felt the touch of it's taint before, but the smoke made it hard to think, clouded my mind as it clouded my Sight and my feelings. I felt nothing of joy or happiness, saw no light and no escape. I felt everything the smoke was made of, and it was wearing at my mind, infinitely slow, and yet too quickly to heal.

And the whispers. The whispers were a message, dark and terrible. The sounds were empty, hollow, untouchable. It felt like a memory, a remnant of sound, but it was horrible.

The whispers were sobs of unending sorrow, cold and alone, speaking of loss and a crushing burden to great to bear. The murmurs were shrieks of bloody, deadly agony, screams of betrayed trust and burning rage. They were the last breaths of the dying and the soft, isolated torment of those who could not die. They spoke of a sorrow, a pain, and endless agony and loss that tainted everything it touched. The whispers oozed a slimy, permeating, vile, acidic taint, too evil to comprehend, too present to escape, too powerful to deny. It whispered to dregs of evil at the bottom of my soul, made them rise up and eat at me with the call to serve this deadly shadow of power.

I'd felt the taint before, in a lighter form. But here, I floated in it's inescapable grip. It twisted my mind and my body until it was in control. It opened my mind to _everything_ and it drove me mad, made me compliant and submissive - anything to stop the torment of _everything, all of it at once._

And then the visions came. Past, present, future, everything combined and it _knew_, knew it all; it saw all the power that had been, that was, that could be. It fed off of me and me visions and I let. I adored it and loved it, because it would end the endless agony when I pleased it, when I Saw something that helped it or taught it something new.

It was my Master, and I was happy and willing to serve it.

* * *

><p><strong>Lily<strong>

My life had always been a battle. Everything was a fight, a contest, a competition. If I was too weak, I'd die. I'd nothing but myself since the time I was six. Yes, I had Rose - we'd grown at school, and I loved her like a sister. But she needed _me._ I was the strength she needed when she was weak. I had Raven too, but I bore her burdens when she couldn't. When her visions were to strong or too terrifying, I listened to them so she didn't keep the secrets on her own.

I was _always_ the strongest one. But now Scorpius wanted me to lean on him and depend on him.

_I was dependent on Ginny. She tried to kill me. I was dependent on Papa, but he chose Ginny over me, left me to fend for myself. I was dependent on Scorpius, and the scars from that are still healing. It's a battle, always a fight. My life is about driving on until I'm the last one standing. _

And that's the way I had to heal. If I stopped fighting now, broken and weary as I was, I'd never start again. I'd lie stagnant and weak while the world destroyed me and ripped me apart.

I couldn't be around Scorpius during the day anymore - too many memories and complications. He meant too much, and I trusted him too little right now. Yes, I was his, but Scorpius needed someone to stand beside, fight beside, and before I could be his equal I had to heal.

I'd learned things about myself since the dark place consumed me. Memories I'd repressed for years had been surfacing, and I had a new look on how my past had been. I'd though the dark place was to protect everyone around me, thought it was a sacrifice.

The dark place was selfish. The world terrified me - truly, it did. I'd been left to face it alone when I was still a tiny child. And like a child, I'd looked for comfort, absolutely _anything_ that made me feel safe and protected. The dark place had done that; if I didn't feel pain or anger or fear, the world held nothing that could hurt me.

And I'd learned to rationalize it, because eventually, feeling nothing had just been so much easier than being afraid of _everything_ - including myself.

But now, the dark place was gone. Not gone forever - like any self-destructive habit, the dark place would linger there, the first thought that came to my mind every time I felt something I didn't like. I'd used it to survive for so long that I didn't know how to function without it.

_But when has my life ever been easy? This is a battle, just like everything else. Now I just have to fight myself_.

The thing of it was, I didn't know if I could beat myself. I was the most stubborn person I'd ever had the misfortune to acquaint with, and I was conflicted. Part of myself was against ridding myself of the first and only comfort I had. The dark place was so _useful_, so undeniably_ simple_, and was it so wrong to use it?

But the other part of me, the slight majority of my thoughts saw the dark place as a hateful, selfish dependency. It had failed me like all things did, hadn't it? It was unreliable. But I never failed my self.

And so, instead of staying in the Manor, I went walking. Rumors had flown for years that I could Apparate, and the truth of it was, I could.

I went to Durmstrang, went to Beauxbatons, visited every sight, every smoldering burial ground that Lord Sin had left in his wake. I summoned my strength and my analytical mind, because my logic was everything. Logically, there was nothing to be terrified of. This was a battle, and I knew battle well. Yes, death was a probability, but it was nothing to be afraid of - I had to die sometime, as all things did. This coming war was something to die for, something to live for.

I spoke, too. I visited the families that had been affected, tried to get people to believe me. Not many believed me - that is, not many who hadn't witnessed and survived the attacks. But the wizards and witches left behind were ready to fight.

They were angry. And anger is so useful, so powerful, and so wonderful when war rages.

They followed me back to the Manor, stayed out of Scorpius' wing. And every night, I went back to him, slept in his arms, stayed with him. It _hurt _to leave him when I loved him so much, when I belonged to him, with him, next to him forever.

But I couldn't fight him while I healed. I was barely winning the war with myself, barely abstaining for my disgusting, insistent dependency on the dark place.

And so, our army began to form. Word spread, and it seemed like our entire generation sought me out. There were so many who wanted to fight, who were ready to die for this, who had lost family and friends.

Anger was powerful. But pain - the pain of loss - was what drove us.

If only we'd known, then, that that would be the death of us.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

Next: Chapter Nine: The Sacrificial Instinct


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